


Defense Against the Dark Stairs

by classified



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Chronic Pain, Disability, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Healer Draco Malfoy, Hogwarts, Hogwarts Professors, Hurt Harry Potter, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Torture, Long, M/M, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-08-22
Updated: 2020-11-11
Packaged: 2021-03-06 15:54:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 14
Words: 64,090
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26051485
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/classified/pseuds/classified
Summary: After a terrible curse leaves Harry irrevocably injured and unable to continue as an Auror, he takes a position at Hogwarts as the new Defense Against the Dark Arts professor. Unfortunately, he's not the only alum on the faculty: the Potions professor is none other than Draco bloody Malfoy. It's bad enough that Harry and his old nemesis are to be colleagues -- it's even worse that Harry's expected to rely on Malfoy for the pain-relieving potions that keep him going. But perhaps most difficult of all... has Draco bloody Malfoy actually become maybe kind of decent? Maybe?And why do all the students seem to think they're dating???
Relationships: Draco Malfoy/Harry Potter
Comments: 300
Kudos: 772





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Just your standard-flavor back-to-Hogwarts everyone's-a-grownup-ish rom-com. This one's gonna be longgg and I'll update regularly. I hope that you enjoy it <3

Harry Potter looked around the messy living room of the Hogsmeade cottage where he'd spent so many of his nights over the past years, cataloguing everything he'd miss. There was the green velvet couch that had so sweetly cradled his head the nights he'd drunk too much to apparate home; there was the overstuffed armchair where he'd curled up on countless evenings, gossiping, joking, complaining about work; there, folded in the corner, was the cot he'd slept on for a month last year, when he'd first gotten out of St. Mungo's; and there, in the doorway, were Ron and Hermione, owners of the cottage, watching him with mingled looks of fondness and exasperation. 

"Well," Harry said heavily. "Goodbye forever."

"Oh, honestly," said Hermione, at the same time Ron said, "Bit dramatic, eh, mate?"

"The first Hogsmeade weekend's in October," Hermione said encouragingly. "Just three months away. You'll be so busy you won't even have time to miss us."

“Yeah,” Ron said, “busy giving out detentions to Slytherins."

“No,” said Hermione, “Harry’s not going to be biased like our professors were, are you Harry?”

“Depends on if Slytherins are still shite or not,” Harry said, and Ron cackled. Ten-month old Rosie, perched on his hip, cackled as well, always happy to share a joke. “Anyway, Slytherins will be getting favoritism left and right,“ Harry added, "considering who the bloody potions professor is.“

He was still having trouble getting over the fact that Draco Malfoy was about to be his colleague. The last time they'd seen each other had been the last day of the Battle of Hogwarts nearly thirteen years earlier, and Harry would have been perfectly content to leave it there for the rest of his life. He probably would've managed it, too, if he hadn't been for what had happened last year. Sometimes he still couldn't believe how quickly his life had changed. Just eighteen months ago he'd been the top Auror in the department and a rumored shoe-in to become the youngest-ever Head Auror when Roberts retired; he'd been fast, and strong, and still a holy terror on the Quidditch field. Now he was staring down the barrel of a pity position in academia and tiring from being on his feet for more than five bloody minutes. 

"Neville says Malfoy's so bad anymore," Ron said. 

"Yeah, but that's Neville, isn't it? He likes everyone."

“You’ll go see Draco straightaway, though, won’t you?” implored Hermione. “You won’t let your history together get in the way of your healing?”

“Pain potions are hardly healing,” Harry said, sidestepping the question. The answer was no: he had absolutely no plans to limp pathetically into Malfoy’s office and whinge about how much it hurt. He was, at least according to tabloids, the most powerful wizard of his generation. Surely he could manage a few simple pain potions to keep himself going.

"And you've got your cane?" Hermione continued. "I really think you might consider using it, Hogwarts is the safest place you could be, it's so heavily-warded -- but it's also _enormous_ , you'll have trouble getting around..."

"Cane's in the trunk," Harry said shortly. And there it would stay. Even apart from having been in the papers, the injuries to his leg were impossible to hide; all you had to do was watch him limp across a room. Lesser-known, however, and much easier to conceal, were the injuries to his arm on the same side. He had no grip or fine motor control to speak of anymore and his shoulder waged war if he tried to raise his arm above the waist, which essentially only left him with one free hand -- which he had no intention of filling with a cane. If a situation came up, as it was sure to, he wanted to be holding not a cane but his wand. 

"Stop lecturing him, 'Mione," Ron said. "Give him a kiss and let him go."

Right on time, the Weasley-Granger’s clock — a less doom-and-gloom version of Molly’s old clock, which had been retired after Fred had died — rung half four, and a chipper squeaking voice said, “Goodbye Harry! Goodbye Harry! Goodbye Harry!”

"Oh," Hermione said, wringing her hands, "all right, I'm sorry. The students are lucky, Harry, I know you'll be brilliant."

Harry himself knew no such thing. Hermione put her arms around his neck, and Harry was gratified to see that she did so less carefully than she might have even a few months ago, and he returned her embrace as she kissed his cheek. 

"Thanks again for letting me stay the night," he said. "King's Cross Station would've been a nightmare to manage on this leg, not to mention the train itself."

Although he had a sinking fear that Hermione was correct and Hogwarts would be no easier. All his fond memories of the place had recently turned into memories of how many bloody staircases there were.

He and Ron did an awkward shuffle to exchange a one-armed hug, one of Ron’s arms busy holding a child and one of Harry’s arms busy being useless. Harry kissed the baby on her red-curled head and said morosely, "Goodbye, Rosie. Next time I see you, you’ll be enormous and I’ll have missed your whole precious childhood.”

“Say goodbye to your melodramatic Uncle Harry, who'll see you again before you’ve learned to shit somewhere other than your own trousers,” Ron told his daughter. She let out another hoarse cackle, her one tooth glinting. She'd be a terror when she got older, Harry thought happily. 

Outside, the afternoon sun was bright and mellow in the little village. The Hog's Head -- and the passage to Hogwarts that Aberforth, after much persuasion, had agreed to let Harry use ("Once!") -- was only a few blocks away, and Harry's traveling trunk floated along behind him as he moved down the quiet cobblestone streets, so different from the busy London roads he was used to. He thought briefly of Grimmauld Place, left closed-up under Kreacher's care while he was away during the school year, and had to admit he wouldn't miss coming home to that dark relic of a house. 

Despite the fact that he was running a bit late, he tried to keep his pace unhurried; difficult for someone who’d once hurried everywhere, but he'd taken enough tumbles in the past year and a half to not tempt fate. His leg ached unrelentingly, a dull throb twisting down the curse line from his hip to his knee, but it was doing a good impression of reliability today, none of the looseness in his knee joint that meant it might buckle at any time. Good; he didn’t want his first impression on his students to include going arse over teakettle in the Great Hall.

Strange, to be going back to Hogwarts again. But Harry's life was nothing if not strange. 

:::

Professor McGonagall -- crikey, was he supposed to call her Minerva, now? -- was waiting for him, as promised, on the seventh floor outside the Room of Requirement. Despite her age she looked as stern and stately as ever, peering at him through her spectacles, not-smiling in that smiling way she had, and Harry grinned at her despite himself. 

"All right, Potter?" she said. 

"Hi, Professor. Thanks for waiting for me."

"I was hoping we'd have more time before the Start-of-Term feast," she said, starting off down the hall with no fanfare, "but we've little under an hour so your tour will have to be quick."

"Tour?" Harry said, palming the wall for balance as he started to limp after her. "I have been here once or twice, you know." 

She paused to let him catch up. "Yes, tour, Potter -- first your chambers so you can deposit your trunk --" she eyed the enormous suitcase floating obediently after him "-- and then a quick look at your classroom, so you at least know where you're going tomorrow. Then, of course, the feast."

"Right," Harry said, trying not to look too dismayed. He thought he'd have a minute to himself, to put his leg up and take a few deep breaths, but no, it was all systems go, apparently. And lovely, here was one of the infamous one hundred and forty-two Hogwarts staircases looming before him, a long marble one he remembered hurtling down without a second thought when he was a student here. No railing, of course, excellent. McGonagall was already halfway down by the time he'd managed to take two bloody steps. He was sweating lightly when he reached the bottom, winded from pain and effort, and his trunk nudged him in the back with what felt like sympathy. McGonagall looked at him, flustered. 

"It's only now occurring to me," she said, "that I didn't think to -- that is, it was foolish not to have considered -- well, your room's on the sixth floor and your classroom's on the first."

"Ah," Harry said. "That's -- not ideal."

She pursed her lips as she matched her pace to his. "The potions classroom is closer to your quarters, on the third floor," she said. "I'm sure Draco wouldn't mind if I asked him to --"

"No," Harry said hurriedly, "no, that's all right, I'm sure I'll be fine." He'd figure something out, something that didn't involve Draco bloody Malfoy. In the meantime, he resigned himself to leaving early for breakfast each morning, early enough to accommodate five staircases and, let's face it, five little sit-downs between them. He could use a sit-down right now, but such a luxury didn't appear to be forthcoming. 

McGonagall stopped in a quiet corner of the sixth floor and took out a key ring much bigger than was demanded by the two tiny brass keys hanging from it, and handed it ceremoniously to Harry. 

"Welcome home," she said, with that not-a-smile smile again. 

Harry fit the key in the lock and pushed the door open, blinking at the golden evening light that streamed through the large windows. 

"This is your office, of course," she said. "Then, through that door and down a small passageway you'll find your chambers."

The office was roomy and comfortable, with a red leather sofa, an enormous maple desk and ornately-carved empty bookshelves. It was supremely professorial, with plenty of space for Harry's imposter syndrome to begin dancing around in it. This was an office for a professor: Harry was not a professor. Harry was good at chasing down dark magic and putting dark wizards in prison, not _professing._

"If you'd like to go put your trunk down, I'll wait here," McGonagall said, settling herself on the sofa, and Harry made his way through the door at the back of his office and through a wooden passageway to his rooms. 

He grinned as he stepped through into his bedroom. Now, this was more like it. It looked almost exactly like the room he'd shared with Ron in Gryffindor, except with its own private bath and one bed in place of four. A bed which looked so comfortable Harry couldn't help but sit down with a groan of relief. He took out his wand and lowered the trunk to the floor, then flicked it open and accio'd one of his remaining pain potions, downing it in one go despite the atrocious flavor -- and despite the fact that he was supposed to take it with food. Well, it would be fine if he ate within the hour, and dinner was right around the corner. 

The potion took exactly two minutes to kick in, and Harry gave himself those two minutes to lie back on the bed and stare up at the canopy. It was surreal being here again, and even more surreal to think that at some point, it would be normal. How long would that take? A week? A month? A year, if he didn't get canned before then?

With a fizzing sensation, the relentless throb of his leg suddenly faded to a much more manageable thrum, and Harry sighed with relief. Then he sat up, straightened his robes, and went back out to face the stairs. 

:::

To Harry's delight, Neville was waiting for him outside the Great Hall, beaming in a swirling mass of students. Though he saw Neville regularly, he somehow always managed to forget how unnervingly good-looking he'd gotten, and had to take a moment to transpose the chubby-faced child from his memory onto this tall, handsome man. 

"You made it!" Neville said happily. "Can you believe we'll be colleagues?"

"Who'd have thought?" 

"How's the leg?"

"Er, good, yeah."

"Hermione's asked me to keep an eye on you, see you don't overdo it," Neville said confidingly, then winced. "And -- she told me not to tell you, oh bugger."

"It's all right," Harry assured him, following him through the doors of the Great Hall, trying not to get trampled by teenagers, "I won't tell her you told me."

"Thanks," he said, sounding grateful, then laughed. "No, Harry -- we're this way."

Harry, by force of habit, had turned towards the Gryffindor table, and he let Neville redirect him up to the professor's table at the head of the room. McGonagall was already there in the Headmistress' position, and Harry had to breathe through the memory of another person sitting in that very chair, twinkling blue eyes, long grey beard. 

There were five stairs up to the professor's table, naturally, and Harry took them carefully, thankful for the pain potion that let him appear at least halfway normal for a few hours. He knew his limp was still noticeable, but at least he wasn't the shambling mess that had greeted Professor McGonagall less than an hour before. 

He settled into his chair, McGonagall to his left and Neville to his right, stretching out his leg beneath the table with a wince before turning his attention to the scene in front of him. 

Merlin, they were young, the students. Young, and loud, shouting hellos at one another, screaming in delight as they embraced, pounding on the tables. He couldn't let himself think of how he'd once been one of them, seated for the first time beneath that starry ceiling, transfixed and overwhelmed and quietly, anxiously thrilled to have at last found somewhere that he might, perhaps, belong. 

"Look," Neville nudged him. "It's Malfoy."

Harry steeled himself and looked to the door, searching for a skinny, pale, pointed little weasel, but he didn't see anyone familiar. "Where?"

"Just there, he's coming towards us. Blue robes."

Harry found the blue robes, and blinked. No wonder he hadn't spotted him. Malfoy was still pale, yes, still thin, still pointed, but he was also, unexpectedly, a man. Not a snivelling soot-covered teenager cowering at his mother's side, but a tall, broad-shouldered, strong-jawed, long-striding man.

"Turned out all right, didn't he?" Neville said. "Come Valentines, all the students send him love notes and he gets horribly embarrassed, it's excellent."

"Excellent," Harry echoed. As Malfoy neared, Harry saw he had a tiny, winking diamond stud in one of his delicate nostrils, and for some reason this seemed the biggest change from Hogwarts as Harry had known it. 

Malfoy had a tired, inward expression on his face, but when he looked up and saw Harry staring at him, the pointy weasel made a reappearance in the slight disdainful curl of Malfoy's lip, and Harry was glad to remind himself that just because someone had turned out unfairly gorgeous, it didn't mean they weren't still an absolute prick. 

Malfoy sat at the end of the table and Harry resolutely did not look at him again. His stomach was growling, and he realized with a jolt of horror that he'd forgotten all about the Sorting -- it would be at least an hour before he'd get a chance to eat. He cursed himself silently. He should've scrounged up something to take with his pain potion; if he didn't get something down soon, the effects would fade as quickly as they had come on. 

"Neville," he said. "Have you got a biscuit or something on you? Chocolate frog? Anything?"

Neville dug into his pocket and came up with five linty brown Every Flavor Beans. "I didn't eat them because they're cardboard flavored," he said apologetically, but Harry would take what he could get. He swallowed them quickly, trying not to make a face. Hopefully something was better than nothing. 

However, as the Sorting began, and went on, and on, and on, it became clear that five disgusting jellybeans were not exactly what the Healers had meant when they'd specified "food." Harry's leg began to ache halfway through the Ms, and by the time they reached the Zs he was in a world of discomfort from sitting for so long. Normally this was when he'd stand up, pace about a bit, stretch it out, but he couldn't very well do that in front of the whole school. 

Everyone began clapping and Harry clapped too, and then McGonagall stood and made a speech and Harry gritted his teeth and tried to smile, hungry and tired and a bit groggy from pain, and then suddenly McGonagall was staring at him -- and so was Neville, and so was everyone, and hadn't he once had a nightmare exactly like this, only naked?

"Again," McGonagall said after a moment, "your new Defense Against the Dark Arts Teacher."

Harry realized, with a horror so acute it was almost hallucinatory, that he was expected to make a speech, and there was absolutely no way to get out of it. 

He sucked in a breath and put his good hand on the table, levering himself carefully upright and hoping no one noticed the grip he kept on the back of Neville's chair. He looked out into the sea of young faces, turned towards him like sunflowers, and cleared his throat. 

"Hello," he said. His voice echoed in the quiet. "I'm -- I'm Professor Harry Potter --"

"No shite!" someone shouted from the Gryffindor table, and waves of nervous laughter broke out. 

"Right," Harry said, and risked releasing Neville's chair to push his glasses up his suddenly sweaty nose. Merlin, his leg was killing him. "Well, yes, I'm -- Professor Potter -- your new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher -- I know, I know, no shite --" He met McGonagall's shocked eyes and realized that, obviously, he oughtn't to have said shite, but too late, carry on -- "-- and I'm looking forward to getting to know you all, and, and teaching you defensive magic, and -- I hope no one gets hurt. Thank you."

He sat down heavily in his chair, digging his fingers surreptitiously into his hip beneath cover of the table, and after a slightly stunned moment, the students began dutifully clapping. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Malfoy staring at him with quirked brows, and at his side Professor McGonagall muttered, "Let's hope you're a better teacher than you are an orator, Potter."

Harry smiled weakly and Neville, on his other side, said, "Good job!", in the encouraging tones one might use for a child's indecipherable stick figure drawing. 

Why -- why -- why had he thought this was a good idea? Why hadn't he stayed home in his own spooky, horrible house with his spooky, horrible house elf, drunk off his arse by the fireplace, chugging pain potions til he couldn't see and living off his friend's good graces until they tired of him and he died impoverished and alone?

That genuinely sounded more promising than what he'd agreed to do, which was, to wit: humiliate himself in front of the wizarding world's bright young minds, plus his esteemed old professor, plus his dear old friend, plus his childhood nemesis. 

Dishes appeared across the tables and Harry scowled at them. Too little, too late; where were all these sausages before his potion had started wearing off? But food was food, and he was hungry, and those potatoes looked excellent. 

"Pass the peas," Malfoy said from down the table, and suddenly McGonagall was trying to hand Harry an enormous silver tureen of buttered peas and he was trying to take it. Instantly he knew it was a recipe for disaster.

The thing was, Harry wasn't keen on anyone knowing the full extent of his injuries. Only Ron and Hermione knew how useless his left arm really was. Bad enough that every wizard who kept up on the news knew about his leg -- call him paranoid, but he'd prefer to keep it under wraps that he was essentially down not just one functional limb, but two. It wasn't good to broadcast one's weaknesses to one's enemies, and Harry had more enemies than most. He'd managed to keep the damage to his arm quiet up til now and he was dead-set on keeping it from his students and colleagues. 

But there was no way he'd be able to hold these bloody peas. He gripped the two-handled tureen with his good hand and made a show of folding his fingers around the other handle, but his shoulder was already seizing up in protest of the movement and his fingers wouldn't cooperate and you didn't need to be Professor Trelawney to predict what was about to happen. 

Peas went everywhere. 

Everywhere, but mostly on Harry, and the silver tureen clattered down onto a gravy boat so he was covered in gravy as well, lovely, and some mashed potatoes for good measure, because why not? 

"Fuck," Harry said far too loudly, "Sorry, oh, bloody hell, let me --"

At least he still had his reflexes. His wand was out and the peas, gravy and mashed potatoes were gone before McGonagall had even finished saying, "What on earth, Potter?"

There was a polite pause, and then replacement peas, mashed potatoes and gravy appeared on the table. Harry swallowed, raised his wand again, and sent the peas floating down the table to Malfoy -- as he should've done in the first place. He'd been too busy panicking about his arm to remember that he was a wizard. 

"Sorry," he said again. 

"It's quite all right," said McGonagall. "Are _you?_ "

"Tired," he said honestly. And in pain. 

"You look a bit peaky, mate," Neville said worriedly. 

"I'll be fine after I eat something," Harry said, which would have been true two hours ago. He put a few bites of potato into his mouth to demonstrate, and after a moment, McGonagall and Neville were satisfied enough to stop looking at him. Actually, the food did revive him a bit, though his leg was still shouting for him to get up and stretch it out -- standing for the brief, horrible interlude of the speech hadn't been enough. 

Finally, finally, finally, the meal was over, the students had been gathered by the prefects, the professors Harry didn't know had all shaken his hand and introduced themselves, and Harry at last was free to go. It was with some difficulty that he got to his feet, hip stiff as a board, and took an exploratory step before deciding it was for everyone's good if he waited til the room cleared a bit before he tackled those five stairs and the vast expanse of the Great Hall. He didn't even want to think about the five staircases that lay before him and his bed. 

"Let me walk you back to your room," Neville said, his face anxious, and Harry knew he was thinking of his promise to Hermione. 

"No, go on, I'm fine," Harry said.

"You're not," Neville said stubbornly. "Come on, no one's looking. Take my arm."

But someone was looking: Malfoy was looking. In fact, to Harry's horror, he was coming towards them, and the closer he got, the better-looking he became, which was truly an injustice. 

"Hullo, Potter," he said -- same old drawl, but an octave or so deeper. It was amazing the difference an octave could make. 

"Malfoy," Harry said, as cooly as a person barely keeping their balance could. 

"Looks like we're colleagues," Malfoy said. "For now." He flashed white teeth and Harry flashed his temper. 

"What's that supposed to mean?"

"Haven't you heard? Your position is cursed," Malfoy drawled.

"That curse died when I killed Voldemort," Harry said, and then winced. Really? Was he breaking out the big guns already? "And anyway, Baisley held the job for years."

Malfoy shrugged, looking unconvinced. "Time will tell," he said. 

And with that threatening sign-off, he turned and left. The room was mostly empty, finally, and Harry took a brief, staggering step that must've looked as bad as it felt, because Neville resumed staring at him anxiously. 

"All right," Harry relented. "If you don't mind just helping me up some stairs? I'm sorry about this, I mistimed my pain potion, stupid mistake. I promise you won't have to be looking after me all the time."

"Harry, don't be silly," said Neville. "The times you've looked after me..."

He gripped Neville's shoulder and let him take some of his weight, and together they made their way slowly down the brief stairs and across the Great Hall. By that time Harry's leg had limbered up enough to let him walk unsupported, and Neville ambled along beside him until they came to the wide, twisting marble steps that led to the sixth floor. 

"A railing wouldn't go amiss here," Harry said, leaning heavily on Neville's sturdy arm. 

"I think there's a set with a railing in the west wing, I can check for you tomorrow."

"Merlin, am I the first -- what's the PC term -- er -- mobility-challenged person to set foot in Hogwarts?"

"Moody had that wooden leg," Neville said.

"Hang on, sorry, mind if we --?"

They stopped on the first landing, and Neville said, "D'you want me to -- I could levitate you up?"

"No!" Harry said, too loudly. "No, thanks, but -- no." 

He'd been levitated in that basement last year, his body spun in circles as they'd cast their agonizing, well-planned curses, making sure it hurt, making sure it could never be fixed. He'd been levitated at St. Mungo's when he couldn't stand, floated from room to room, helpless. He'd thought of the Muggles the Death Eaters had levitated at the Quidditch Cup all those years ago, puppets hanging from invisible strings. No. Mobilicorpus was not a spell he'd allow on himself if he could help it; he knew from all-too-recent experiments with it that he'd be left shaky and twitching for hours afterwards. The help was not worth the horror. 

Neville, who'd also seen his fair share of poorly-used levitation, nodded without further comment. 

On the landing of the fifth floor, waiting for Harry to catch his breath, Neville suddenly said, "Floo!"

"Gesundheidt?"

"No, the Floo Network!" Neville said excitedly. "I wonder if we can set up Floo stations on each floor -- you've got a fireplace in your classroom, haven't you? And your office, too, I expect. You can't Floo in and out of Hogwarts, but I bet you can Floo within it!"

"Neville," Harry said, hope rising. "That's brilliant."

"I don't know if it will work," Neville said, flushing with pleasure. 

"It doesn't matter, it's just -- it's really good of you to even think about it."

"Sorry I didn't think of it earlier," Neville said, releasing Harry as they reached the top of the stairs. 

"Well, why should you? It isn't your problem."

Neville shook his head, looking affronted. 

"Anyway," Harry said, "I'm all right from here, I think." He paused and said, "You're a good mate, Neville. See you at breakfast?"

"Just like old times," Neville said happily, and bounded away down the staircase, with such ease that Harry had to turn away.


	2. Chapter 2

Harry's first week went by in a blur, but it was, he thought, mostly a success.

His first class of the day was Hufflepuff and Gryffindor first years, which seemed like a good, non-intimidating place to start, and considering his own first-year Defense professor had been possessed by Voldemort, he felt confident he'd be better than that, at least. He'd had a pain potion with breakfast and was much more mobile than the previous night, but he'd still misjudged the distance from the Great Hall and arrived a few minutes late to find a class of huge-eyed, silent students waiting behind their desks. 

"What," he said, looking around at them, "are you fighting, already? Why aren't you chattering to one another?"

No answer. 

"I suppose you've only just met," he said. "Oh, does that make this your very first class at Hogwarts, ever? I'm honored."

There, a few smiles. Merlin, they were young, and innocent, their eleven year-old faces as unformed as puppies. He sat at his desk, glancing at the parchment in his hand. 

"All right, we'll start with attendance. If I say your name wrong or if you'd like to be called something else, let me know. And --" He tried to recall what Hermione had told him about ice-breaking exercises, "Tell the class -- er -- tell us what you dressed as for Halloween last year."

They perked up a bit, and as he went down the list they became more responsive, smiling, then laughing, then chiming in comments on their classmate's costumes. All was going well until Harry reached "Perkins, Timmy."

"I'm here," said a small boy in the front row. 

"And what were you for Halloween last year?"

Timmy Perkins looked miserable, and said something very quietly. 

"Sorry," Harry said, "d'you mind speaking up?"

Timmy raised his head and said, loudly and sadly, "I was you!"

Titters broke out around the room, and Harry blinked. "I'm a costume?" he said. 

"Oh, yes!" someone called. 

"Yeah, they sell you at Weasley's!"

"What?" Harry said. He needed to have a word with George. "What do they sell?"

"Big round glasses!" shrieked a little girl excitedly. "And a fake scar!"

"And, and a fake firebolt!"

"And this ugly, messy black wig," said a very freckled boy. "Your real hair is much nicer, Professor."

"I didn't know you were a real person," said Timmy defensively. "I mean, I knew, but -- but I didn't _really_ know."

"That's all right," Harry said. "Maybe I'll be _you_ this year."

The class erupted into laughter, and Harry grinned. Was it possible he wouldn't be a total wash at this?

The second years were equally pleasant, but once he got to the third years things started getting tricky. He could smell the adolescence on them as soon as they entered the room, and the striations between the houses were more apparent, Gryffindors clustering with Gryffindors, Slytherins with Slytherins. They also seemed much more curious about him than he would have preferred. 

"Don't be alarmed if I get up every now and then and walk around a bit," Harry said, same as he'd said to his first two classes. "I have trouble sitting for long periods of time."

A hand shot up. Parkinson, Galen. Snub-nosed and somehow familiar. Oh, Merlin, he did remember hearing that Pansy had popped one out right after school...

"Yes, Parkinson?"

"Professor," said Galen officiously, "if you're so good at Defense Against the Dark Arts, why didn't you defend yourself against the curses that made you limp like that?"

Harry felt the classroom tense collectively, a few students exchanging aghast glances with one another, a few grinning at the cheek, and he struggled in the silence for something to say, too startled for a quick answer. He knew the incident had been in all the papers, but he hadn't realized his students might be familiar with it. He didn't like thinking of them reading about it, how he'd been drugged, tied down, tortured, his wand taken, his body broken. Felt a bit out-of-bounds for a student-teacher relationship. 

To his surprise, someone else came to his rescue. "He did defend himself!" said a dark-skinned girl with very short black curls, a Gryffindor named – Harry checked his list -- Hanna Seid. "He killed the wizards who kidnapped him!"

"Oh, well now," Harry said, alarmed. "Let's not -- we're here to learn defense, not --"

"My dad's an Auror," Hanna said, turning to Harry, "Negasi Seid, he was on your team, Professor."

Harry blanched. Negasi was one of the people who'd found him chained up in that basement, surrounded by the bodies of the men who'd taken him, his own body broken beyond repair. The whole extraction team had been put through mandatory counseling, Negasi included. What had he told his daughter?

"Your dad's an excellent auror," he said, trying to stay in the moment, trying not to slip back into that basement. "And Galen -- Defense Against the Dark Arts is, above all, about staying alive. I'm here, aren't I? I count that as a win."

"How'd you kill them?" someone wanted to know.

"He used wandless magic!" Hanna answered, swiveling in her chair. "They exploded!"

The class let out a collective, "Oooh!"

Harry, who'd been sitting behind the desk, got to his feet, trying not to give away how agitated he felt. 

"All right," he said, "look, I know I'm -- I know you all know who I am. Maybe your parents know me, or you've read about me in the papers, and I'm probably in your history books, right?" Nods all around. "It's natural to be curious about that and I don't mind answering polite questions in my office. But during class time, all I am is your Professor. I'm here to teach you the skills you need to survive, but I hope you'll never have to use them. I have had to use them, as you know -- but I have never used them lightly. The times I've had to defend myself, well, to be honest, those aren't fun times for me to talk about, and my life's not an adventure story, not for me; for me, it's just my life. And Defensive magic has saved that life more times than I can count. Anytime you see me up here, talking to you, still alive, well, that's Defensive magic at work. You can safely assume that if I'm teaching you a spell, I've probably used it. And that's -- that's all I really want to say about it."

There was a silence, then a boy in the back called, "Bravo, Professor!", and there was a brief but enthusiastic applause. Harry, heart thudding, lowered himself back behind the desk. Galen Parkinson sneered at him; Hanna Seid, and most of the rest of the class, beamed at him.

"Right," he said. "Who's heard of a boggart?"

A hand shot up so fast that Harry thought fondly of Hermione. "Yes, you in the red -- Maggie, is it?"

"A boggart's a shapeshifter that takes the shape of the viewer's worst fear," said Maggie promptly. "It can be defeated by laughter."

"Excellent! Ten points to Gryffindor." Then, seeing the Gryffindors’ smug smiles and thinking of Hermione's admonishing face, he added, "Er, and ten points to Slytherin."

Absolute bloody pandemonium. 

"Professor, you can't --!"

"That isn't fair, they didn't --!"

"It doesn't work like --!"

"Sorry," Harry shouted above them, "Sorry, that's my rule!" A rule he was only just making up this very instant. "If one of you does well, you all do well! If one of you goes down, you all go down."

"What about detention?" Galen demanded, outraged. "If Hanna here calls you a crippled berk, will we all go to detention with her?"

The class quieted at his words, again looking aghast, and Harry sighed. "Thank you, Galen," he said. 

"For -- for what?"

"For providing me with the chance to demonstrate my answer, by giving you detention. Just you, no one else."

"Bravo, Professor!" roared the same boy in the back, and Harry decided to get very, very drunk that night. 

:::

The next morning, Malfoy stopped him outside the Great Hall before breakfast. Harry looked at him blearily, a bit hungover from the half-bottle of firewhiskey he and Neville had drunk to celebrate – and commiserate -- their first day.

"My students tell me you're giving out House points with absolutely no regard for tradition," said Malfoy. "I suppose the rules still don't apply to the famous Harry Potter, do they?"

Harry, who was overdue for his pain potion and in no mood, said, "Just trying to help Slytherin along. They'd never win a point otherwise."

Malfoy narrowed his eyes, that little diamond nose stud flashing, the world's tiniest, sexiest distraction. "It’s not actually the worst idea I've ever heard. I'll be curious to see how it works."

Then he was gone, leaving Harry extremely confused about how insulted he was supposed to be. 

Other than those few hills and valleys, classes were going well, Harry thought. He might not quite know how to educate children, but he had to admit he knew the material inside and out, and watching them master spells was unexpectedly gratifying. The first time someone banished a Boggart he nearly cried with joy and pride. 

The problem, of course, was his own terrible body. 

Neville had raised the Floo idea with McGonagall, who'd brought it to the Hogwarts board, who'd brought it to the Regulation of Floo Networks, who'd promised to have an answer by the end of the second week, which meant for now, Harry was stuck running all over the castle and climbing so many stairs that when he demonstrated the Boggart lesson, his own showed up as a staircase. 

He'd wheedled a week and a half's worth of pain potions from his regular St. Mungo's potionist, twenty-two doses in total, and the timing worked out perfectly to cover him from about eight in the morning until ten in the evening -- if he took two a day, as he was supposed to. He'd begged and begged his potionist to deliver to Hogwarts, but they'd explained -- first patiently, then less patiently -- that as Hogwarts had its own official potionist duty-bound to serve the Hogwarts community, they couldn't legally cross-medicate, especially not the kind of heavily-regulated potion Harry took. 

It should have been easy. Harry had a prescription, and all he had to do was give it to Malfoy, the Potions master, and he knew Malfoy would have to make it -- but the idea of this was abhorrent to him on nearly every level. For one thing, that was like giving Malfoy explicit permission to poison him. For another, although he wished he could claim otherwise, the truth was that he was embarrassed by the limitations of his body and didn't want to broadcast his vulnerabilities to someone who would no doubt take pleasure in them. 

And lastly, well, pain... it was personal. It permeated everything Harry did, it dictated how he lived his days, he spent an inordinate amount of time trying to cater to his pain, and even though anyone who looked at him could probably see his pain, it still felt oddly private. He wanted to keep it to himself, he wanted to hide it. The Healers at St. Mungo's were professionals, they were impersonal -- but Malfoy? With Malfoy, it'd be personal. 

The two biggest problems Harry faced were:

1) In order to make his own potions, he'd have to break into Malfoy's office, steal the supplies, then go into the Potions room in the dead of night and brew them as quickly as he could. 

2) Harry was still, after all these years, absolute shite at making potions. 

So instead he did something he _was_ good at, and procrastinated. He rationed his potions to one a day, taking one with breakfast at eight and then toughing it out when it began to wear off around four. This unfortunately meant his last class of the day got a notably less kind and patient Professor, but after that he was free to go to his rooms and take a hot bath and be in pain in peace. He arranged with the house elves to have dinner in his own chambers, at least until he refilled the potions, and all in all it was a bearable arrangement. 

Until, inevitably, the potions ran out. 

He woke up on Wednesday morning of his third week of classes with one potion remaining, and knew his time was up. He had to break into the Potions office that very night or suffer the consequences, which would require a bit of reconnaissance work, which would require going into the Potions office during daylight hours, which would require talking to Draco Malfoy, which was another reason Harry'd put this off for so long. 

He did have an excuse: Malfoy was -- of course -- Head of Slytherin, and one of the Slytherin first years didn't seem to be coming along as well as the others. Her name was Chloé and even apart from her poor performance, she seemed... sad. She rarely spoke in class, not to Harry and not to her classmates, and when anyone did try to speak with her she replied in monosyllables. She didn't seem unfriendly, she just seemed vacant, and Harry was genuinely concerned. Even if he hadn't needed an excuse to speak with Malfoy, he'd have brought this to her Head of House. 

Malfoy's office hours were after lunch, which coincided with Harry's free period, so he gathered his courage and his energy and hauled himself up two flights of stairs to the Potions office. He was starting to get to know his students, and when they called out to him as they passed he was able to greet them mostly by name, which cheered him. He paused at the top of the second flight and took a moment to lean against a wall, catching his breath and calming his nerves and trying to let the stair-induced pain subside so he could tone down his limp and make a better entrance. He smoothed his robes, tucked his bad left hand casually into his pocket, and knocked on his office door. 

The door flew open. Harry stepped inside. 

Malfoy was sitting behind his desk, bent over a stack of parchment, quill in hand, looking like the professor Harry knew he himself would never be. He glanced up when Harry came in, and his only concession to surprise was one long, slow blink. 

"Potter," he said. Languidly, he replaced his quill in the bottle of ink. "What is it?"

"I wanted to talk with you about a student. One of yours. A Slytherin, I mean. Chloé Barnes."

Something flickered across Malfoy's face but Harry couldn't read it. "Yes?"

There was a chair in front of Malfoy's desk, and Harry would have very much liked to sit in it. But Malfoy didn't offer it and so he stayed standing. He eased his weight onto his right leg, trying to make the movement look casual, and trying, too, to look like he wasn't casing the room. Glass cabinets of visible biological ingredients: feathers, beaks, feet, eyes, etc. Wooden cabinets of who knew what. Filing cabinets, probably of files. 

"I'm... concerned about her. About her... her mental health." 

Now Malfoy registered an emotion Harry recognized: surprise. "Have a seat."

Harry crossed the room to the chair, too-aware of Malfoy's eyes on him, trying very hard not to limp more than he had to. The chair was extraordinarily low and aggressively uncomfortable and the moment he'd sat down, he knew he should get right back up, but it was too late to do so without looking very odd. All the cabinets, he noted, had what looked like the same style of lock, which was vaguely familiar. Maybe they'd used them in the auror department?

"What concerns you?" Malfoy said. 

Harry told him what he'd observed about Chloé; her performance was poor, she wasn't socializing, she wasn't responsive, she seemed depressed. Malfoy listened with uncharacteristic attention while Harry spoke, even going so far as to nod minutely from time to time. 

"Anyway," Harry finished. "I thought you should be aware."

Malfoy didn't say anything. 

"Have you noticed that behavior in your class?" Harry prompted. 

Malfoy opened his mouth, then closed it. He looked a bit flushed. He opened his mouth again. Closed it again. 

"Malfoy," Harry said. He leaned forward, good elbow on good knee. "Is there something I should know?"

"I'm trying to decide the answer to that question right now."

"Fine, take your time," Harry said. "I've only got homework to grade, classes to teach, stairs to conquer." Whoops, now it was his turn to flush. He hadn't meant to say that last part. 

"It's a delicate subject," Malfoy said. "And --" He looked suddenly deeply uncomfortable. "All right. I think you should know, yes, that Chloé Barnes is the daughter of Gibson Ackley. Her mother changed their name for -- well, for obvious reasons."

For a moment, the name didn't register, probably because Harry had spent the better part of eighteen months trying never to think it. But some part of his lizard brain told him to school his face, and sure enough, when the name clicked, he was grateful for the stony expression he'd already plastered on. 

Gibson Ackley, pureblood, Voldemort champion, had lost his fortune in the war and never gotten over it. He'd been one of three wizards who'd devised the meticulous, years-in-the-making plan to capture Harry, torture him, cripple him, and obliviate him so thoroughly he'd be left mindless and broken. They'd fully succeeded at the first two jobs; gotten halfway through the third; and failed the fourth. Harry, wandless and barely conscious, had exploded Gibson Ackley's head. 

And now the man's daughter was forced to take notes while he lectured on hexes. 

"Merlin," Harry breathed. "No wonder she won't talk in my class."

"It's not just your class," Malfoy said. "She's withdrawn in general."

"Who can blame her?"

Malfoy gave him a considering look. "Well -- you could. Given the givens."

"She's a kid," Harry said hotly, "she had nothing to do with it."

"I agree," Malfoy said, "but I think that, compounded by actual grief for her father, she's feeling a lot of guilt. Especially where you're concerned. You're the savior of the wizarding world, and she's the child of a man who tried very hard to kill you."

Gibson Ackley and the other two had not been trying to kill Harry. They'd been trying to destroy him. But Harry let this slide.

"It was in all the papers, you know," Malfoy added. 

"I know."

Malfoy suddenly dropped his gaze from Harry's face to the stack of parchment on his desk. He adjusted his quill in its inkpot and moved a jar of something green from the right side of the desk to the left. "I want to be clear," Malfoy said, addressing the jar of something green, "that -- that I'm sorry for what happened to you."

Harry blinked, and then, for want of anything better to say, "Thanks?"

"I have no sympathy for Gibson Ackley, or the others."

Harry very much doubted that, given what he knew of Malfoy, but he said, "All right."

"But -- imagine being a child and looking at the news, and seeing your father's name plastered everywhere, called a villain, an evil madman, public enemy number one. Even if he deserved it, I imagine it would be... difficult."

Malfoy didn't have to imagine it, Harry realized. Lucius's imprisonment after the war -- and his subsequent death in Azkaban -- had been salacious gossip for years. 

Gingerly, he took his left hand from his pocket so he could lay it across his left knee. He pressed the palm into the aching joint, trying to work out some of the tension, but stopped at the answering flicker of pain in his shoulder. Thanks to Chloé's dad. How had he not known the man had children?

"Would it help if I talked to her, do you think?" Harry said. "If I -- Merlin, I don't know. If I tell her I don't blame her, I'm not angry with her?"

Malfoy, for the first time, looked at Harry as if he were almost human. "Yes. I think it might help. If you felt -- if you feel you could."

"I'll do it this week," Harry said. "Poor kid, I wish I'd known earlier. Thanks for telling me." A sudden thought occurred to him and he said, "Did any of the other two have kids I'm teaching?"

"If so, they're not in Slytherin," Malfoy said. 

Harry nodded, and put his good hand on the arm of the chair. It really was miraculously uncomfortable, and his hip was stiff enough that rising was going to be a bit of a production. He held his breath and gave it his best shot, which failed him. Malfoy suddenly found his stack of parchments very interesting again. Red-faced, Harry gave it another go, and this time he managed to get all the way upright. The potion he'd taken at breakfast was beginning its slow fade, reminding him of his primary reason for visiting, and as he turned he looked closely at the brass lock on the door of the wooden cabinet. 

A second later, he nearly laughed. He recognized that style of lock -- he had one just like it in his own office. They were everywhere, generic charmed locks that were universally accessible by faculty and universally closed to students. 

"Potter," Malfoy said suddenly, with an odd energy. "Let me know if you -- if you need --" He seemed to run out of steam, and finished limply, "More information."

Harry nodded, and left. 

:::

Breaking into Malfoy's office later that night was almost laughably simple. Invisibility cloak plus twelve years' experience as an Auror plus an employee development course he'd taken a few summers ago on ward-breaking plus the universal faculty lock meant that Harry was in and out with the potions ingredients in under ten minutes. Malfoy, bless him, was fantastically organized, and he had no trouble finding the ingredients on the list. 

What he did have trouble with was the potion itself. 

"Counterclockwise," he muttered. "One, two, three -- oh, why are you blue? Please, please be yellow instead."

He should've let Snape teach him something, those years ago. He'd always thought potions were time-consuming, finicky bits of magic, slow and subtle where Harry preferred fast and effective -- but he'd never expected to rely so heavily on that slow subtlety. 

It didn't help that his left hand wasn't good for much other than holding down herbs as he chopped them. It also didn't help that he was making the potion to replace the pain potion he'd run out of, so after two hours of intensive brewing he was damp with sweat and wavering on his feet. 

But finally, finally, he was done. It was supposed to be a light, sunshine yellow, but chartreuse would have to do. It smelled as his other potions had, anyway, which was a good sign, wasn't it? There was no time like the present to find out. He'd brought biscuits as a food-buffer, and before he'd even poured it into vials, he measured himself out a dose and drank it down, then quickly ate a biscuit. 

One minute passed. One and a half. A minute forty five. 

And, oh, there it was, sweet relief. It swept through Harry like a spring rain, the roar of his leg and the growl of his shoulder fading until they were mere whimpers. He had done it! Thank Merlin, it had worked. 

He used his wand to pour and fill the vials he'd lifted from Malfoy, the only thing he was concerned might be noticed missing, since he'd taken 60 of them, enough for a month, but oh well, vials were easy to come by, he'd put in an order later so he wouldn't have to steal them next month. Then, with utmost care, he packed them into a bookbag, cleaned the potions classroom, and had a mostly pain-free staircase experience to his bedroom, where he fell into a lovely, pain-free sleep. 

He woke up an hour later with a gasp, agony rocking through him. His leg was on fire, it was getting cursed all over again, his shoulder was being pulled from its socket and rotated, he couldn't even breathe for the pain of it. The pain potion was on his nightstand and he managed to fumble a vial free and pop the cork one handed, chugging it desperately then lying back and counting the seconds, trying not to vomit or scream, 

One minute. A minute and a half. A minute forty five.

And ah, yes, there, the pain was being washed from his body, his muscles unclenching, his blood unboiling. He was panting, still, the aftermath of pain, but little by little his breathing slowed and the sweat cooled on his body. What had happened? It couldn't be the potion, could it? No, the potion was amazing, the potion was everything he needed, it had been an anomaly, it had been a fluke -- right?

Wrong.

Harry's potion worked perfectly -- for just over one hour. And there were so many, many hours in a day and night. 

"Harry, you look knackered," Neville said the next morning. He poured him a glass of pumpkin juice and slid it over. Harry nodded his thanks. 

"Yeah, didn't sleep much," Harry said. "No reason, nothing specific, just insomnia."

"Well, good luck staying awake during the faculty meeting. They're dry as uncooked macaroni."

Shit. Harry had forgotten all about the meeting that afternoon, his first of the semester. He'd wanted to appear the paragon of professionalism, but instead he was going to look like day-old gruel. His watch chirped merrily and he quickly downed a vial of potion, then reached for a piece of toast. At least he wasn't in pain. But he'd have to break back into Malfoy's office and make more potion tonight, if he wanted to keep the relief going beyond tomorrow, which he very much did. Maybe his second try would be more up to snuff.

"Professor," one of his first years said as he came in. "Your hair looks like a Harry Potter wig!"

Everyone laughed merrily. Harry despaired. 

Pockets and stomach full of potion and biscuits, Harry made his way to the faculty meeting just in time for the opening remarks, which were delivered in a monotone by Professor Soobs, who'd replaced Hagrid as Care of Magical Creatures professor when he'd retired to the mountains with his giant little brother. Neville nodded to him as he came in, and Harry took the seat next to him. 

"First announcement," announced McGonagall. "We have been approved for an in-castle Floo network and will commence construction immediately."

Harry, who was always floored by good news, nearly dropped the water glass he'd just reached for. 

"For reasons of accessibility, we will be adding public-use Floo to the Great Hall and to certain classrooms, and warded Floo to any private offices and chambers who request it."

Everyone was looking at Harry, smiling benevolently, and he would've been embarrassed about this attention but he was too delighted. No more stairs! Maybe he wouldn't even need to brew any more potion!

"We expect to complete construction within a month."

All good news came with a clause. 

"Next announcement is from Professor Malfoy," McGonagall said. "Draco, take the floor."

Malfoy spoke from his seat, where he was draped casually, comfortably, quill behind an ear, the picture of professorial elegance. 

"I've had a theft in my office," he said. 

Little gasps all around the table. Harry's blood went cold and he willed his face not to change. Aiming for pure nonchalance, he flicked his wand to pour himself a glass of water. 

"Several ingredients have gone missing from my cupboards, including a highly narcotic and rigidly restricted form of Daddy Longlegs venom. I'm also missing sixty valuable diamond-plated vials that the school generously ordered for me to advance my own research."

Harry nearly choked. Diamond-plated? Oh, merciful mother of Merlin. 

"I've increased the wards around my office and the caretaker is providing all-night security to ensure nothing else is taken until we find the culprit," Malfoy said. "I don't think I need to explain how serious it is to imagine such ingredients in the hands of amateurs."

"We must all be on the lookout," McGonagall said. "Double-check your own locks and wards as soon as you're able, and make certain that any valuable or potent equipment is well-hidden. The prefects will be going through the common rooms and bedrooms this evening to see if we can recover any of these stolen items. Now, third announcement: shall we allow armadillos as student pets? Discuss."

The rest of the faculty meeting went by in a blur, and Harry excused himself five minutes early to take a potion, eat a biscuit, and panic. He couldn't break into that office again, that much was clear. Nor could he let a student possibly be blamed for what he'd done, but maybe no one would be blamed, maybe it would be shrugged off as a mystery and life would go on and Harry would find another way to get his potion. By tomorrow night at 2am when he'd take the last vial. 

Well, fine. He could do without until he figured out what to do. Was it ideal, no, it wasn't ideal. Did this current batch of poorly-made potion have an absolute nightmare of withdrawal, yes, it did. Maybe the smartest thing to do would be cancel his classes tomorrow, take a sick day, and stop taking this batch as soon as possible. Get the effects out of his system so he'd just be normally-in-pain by the following day. Yes: that was exactly what he'd do. 

He swallowed down potions through the next few hours of classes, and as soon as his final class ended he went to his office, wrote a memo announcing the cancellation of all Professor Potter's classes for the next day, and got into bed. 

There he stayed for the next twelve hours. It was a deeply unpleasant night. The less said about it, the better. 

By three pm the following day, he'd ridden out the last of the withdrawal agonies and vowed never to make another potion again in his entire wretched life. Neville came by to check on him in the evening, and Harry met him in his office, looking so terrible that Neville actually gasped. 

"Was it food poisoning?" Neville asked. 

Inspired, Harry said, "Yes!"

Neville pressed a big hand to Harry's forehead. "I don't think you have a fever, though you are a bit sweaty. Should I call -- someone? Hermione?"

Harry laughed weakly. "Let's not bother the Minister for Magic about food poisoning."

"But good news about the Floo, isn't it?"

"Yeah -- it's excellent. I can't thank you enough for the idea."

"Have you been getting around all right so far?"

Harry croaked, "Great," and it was a testament to the depth of Neville's friendship that he didn't call him on the lie. "Any progress on the -- the theft?"

"Malfoy reckons he knows who it is," Neville said, wide-eyed. "Said he's trying to figure out the right punishment. I know we did some wild stuff as students, but it looks so much more dramatic from this end, doesn't it? Feel sorry for the kid who did it, I wouldn't want Malfoy angry at me. Been there, done that, no thank you."

Shit. Harry'd likely earned some innocent kid a year's worth of detention. What if it was a Quidditch player? What if Gryffindor lost the cup because of him? Merlin, what had he gotten himself into? He had to confess.

"Look, Neville, thanks for coming by, but I'm still not feeling all that great. I need to lie down."

"Oh, of course," Neville said, bouncing up. "Will you teach tomorrow?"

"Yeah, I think it was a -- a 24-hour bug. I should be fine by the morning." Some measure of fine, anyway. 

"At breakfast, then," Neville said. "Feel better, Harry."


	3. Chapter 3

Harry did not make it to breakfast the next day. 

Normally, to get to the Great Hall, he took a specific set of winding wooden stairs that were valuable both for their sturdy railings and for the fact that almost no one else seemed to know about them, so it was less likely he'd humiliate himself in front of someone, especially a student. He felt that seeing your Defense Against the Dark Arts professor unable to Defend Against the Dark Stairs would make it hard to take him seriously. 

He wasn't what you might call comfortable that morning, still wrung-out from his stupid adventure in self-medicating, and the knowledge that he had no relief to look forward to was distracting in and of itself. It was, he realized, the first day since he'd been injured that he'd have no medication whatsoever. He'd sent an owl to St. Mungo's begging them yet again to deliver the potions to him and had had an owl back with just three words: Give It Up! His options were getting narrow and narrower, and most of them rhymed with Baco Talfoy. 

He'd woken early but it still took him twice as long as usual to get ready, even leaning on the wooden cane that had never left his chambers. Everything was blurry, hard to make out, and he'd smashed a jug of water before he realized he'd forgotten to put on his glasses for perhaps the first time ever. His leg was screaming at him for the hours he'd spent in bed ridding his body of that stupid bloody potion, and for the first time he seriously considered bringing the cane through the castle with him, even if it meant leaving his wand-hand occupied. But his reflexes and intuition were all he had, these days; what if today was the day something happened, and he wasn't fast enough? What if someone took his wand again in the time he spent dropping the cane to reach for it? What if an enemy broke into the castle and into the classroom and forced Harry to watch as his students were tortured in front of him?

Absolutely not an option. He hung the cane back on the footboard of his bed and took a few practice steps around the room. His knee didn't seem to want to take his weight today and he put a hasty Locking charm on it, freezing it straight so it wouldn’t buckle, though he knew he’d pay later for holding it one position so long. He pocketed his wand, guzzled a glass of water, looked at himself in the mirror, sorely regretted having done so, and was off. 

Halfway out the door he caught a sour smell and realized he was wearing three-day old robes, the same robes he'd sweated through several times over thanks to his terrible horrible poisonous potion, and had to turn back to put on clean ones. By now he was not only too late for breakfast, he was late for his first class, as well, and by the time he got out into the hallway it was empty. Everyone was where they were supposed to be, except Harry. 

His favorite staircase was on the other side of the sixth floor, a narrow, little-used wooden thing that wound down through its own stone passage, sturdy banisters on both sides and a convenient landing with a windowseat halfway down where he often stopped to rest. He thumped down the hallway towards it, trying desperately to remember his lesson plan for the morning and feeling more like Moody than ever, wild-eyed, jumpy, mental. If he got downstairs within ten minutes he'd only be fifteen minutes late, and that wasn't so bad, was it? It wasn't a fireable offense, right? Would his students wait for him or would they take his lateness as an excuse for a free period? 

The windowseat was in sight, but Harry had no time to stop. He leaned heavily on the banister and picked up his pace, swinging his immobilized knee from a hip that was decidedly not made for swinging, eyes forward -- and even later he couldn't have said how it happened. 

One minute he was lowering himself down onto the next step, and the next minute he was falling. 

He grabbed for the banister but it was too late, his balance was gone and he was plunging forward, tipping over on a leg that couldn't bend, both arms flying forward instinctively to catch his fall, his bad shoulder howling at the sudden movement, and then -- BAM -- he hit the landing.

It was unclear how long he lay there, gasping. Pure reflex had had him twisting in time to make sure he landed on his good side, which was the only mercy, and he curled up as small as he could go, as if that might give the pain less surface area to deal with. The pain stole every thought he had, it stole his very mind and turned him into nothing more than a body, a conduit for agony, like the Cruciatus but unrelenting because there was no one on the other side of it to lower their wand and grant him a reprieve. All he could do was try to keep breathing until it released him enough to be himself again. 

Quite a long time later, maybe an hour, maybe two, maybe no more than ten minutes, Harry got his good arm beneath him and managed to sit up, dragging his stiff leg as he propped himself up against the wall. His hands were trembling uncontrollably from the pain but he managed to pat himself down and make sure nothing -- else -- had broken, which thank Merlin, it had not. All his working limbs were still working. All his non-functional limbs were still non-functional. His head was intact, his glasses were still on his face. To his deep shame, he'd only fallen about two steps. 

Another hour, or two, or ten minutes later, he'd managed to hoist himself up onto the windowseat. He'd also attempted to stand, managed it by the skin of his teeth, and nearly fallen down another flight of stairs the moment he tried to take a step. 

Now, he sat on that windowseat, halfway up, halfway down, unable to move in either direction. Every time he tried to get back up, his body protested so convincingly that he stopped. He could feel the black bile of the curse in his joints, seeping through his knee like viscous liquid and twisting up his thigh, settling in his hip and sending dark tendrils to coil in his shoulder and swollen fingers, a feeling like fire, if fire could hold a hammer and bang.

Clearly, he was not going anywhere under his own steam. Even with his hatred of Mobilicorpus he'd have gladly used it on himself right now, if such a thing were possible, but at the very least he could send a Patronus to Neville, begging assistance. It was humiliating beyond all reason and Neville would probably report straight to Hermione and Harry would get a scolding, but right now a tongue-lashing from Hermione sounded like actual heaven compared to what was happening right now. 

He put his hand in his pocket for his wand, feeling around in the fabric, fingers groping, searching, and the truth was so extremely bad, so ludicrously unlucky, that it took him a very long time to accept it. 

He did not have his wand.

He, Harry Potter, had left his wand behind, for the first time in his entire adult life. 

Like a nightmare he saw himself pocketing his wand, then taking off his dirty robes, swapping them out for the clean ones. He'd swapped the robes; he had not swapped the contents of his pocket. 

This was his favorite staircase because no one ever took it, something that had seemed wonderful just yesterday but now seemed like a possible nail in his coffin. Maybe no one would ever come by, maybe he'd never be able to move, maybe he'd be entombed here and eaten by rats. 

The most powerful wizard of his generation: ha! What use was power if he couldn't use it, couldn't control it? The last time he'd been this desperate, in pain, without his wand, he'd cracked something inside himself and exploded three people so completely that there'd been nothing left of them but teeth. He'd felt it before, the raw crackle of magic with no outlet, the kind of magic that only wizard children possessed and that everyone else grew out of, but Harry never quite had. Uncontrolled; dangerous. Dark. He could feel it in him now, roiling like the curse in his joints, and he was afraid. 

Once more, he tried to stand. Once more, he could not. Distantly he heard the clatter of people moving through hallways, students chattering, someone shouting. Another period had started. Second? Third? Fourth? Harry had lost all time. He made another effort at movement and bit his lip so hard blood began to run down his chin. He mopped it with his sleeve, staring at the wet stain on the black fabric. 

Sweet Merlin, this was dismal. 

Maybe he should cry? Would he feel better if he cried? He wanted to, but it would probably hurt, so better just focus on his breathing, focus on believing that the pain would eventually ebb, the sick throb of the curses would eventually recede, eventually he'd be able to get up, not now, but eventually, soon, any minute. 

Again that crackle of power, asking to be let out. _What_ , Harry asked it. _You want to explode the walls? How will that help us?_ It sang in him, seeking release, seeking a target, and Harry grit his teeth not only against the pain, now, but against his own magic, banging against the walls of his body like it might break through. 

At first he thought he was imagining the footsteps on the staircase, but they grew louder, closer, unmistakable, the light steps of a small person, and Harry sat up, panicked. He'd wanted someone to come, but not this, not a student, not while his magic was thrashing around like a bomb about to go off. 

"Professor? Professor Potter?"

It was Hanna, of course it was Hanna, because she was the absolute last person he wanted seeing him like this; Hanna, secretly his favorite student, beloved daughter of the friend and former colleague who'd found him in that terrible basement.

"Hanna," he said. "Stay back. Stay back, please." He tried to keep his voice calm. He didn't want to alarm her. 

Hanna stopped several steps below the landing, her dark eyes wide with fear. "Professor, are you all right? It's -- it's time for class."

So it was third period. He'd been here nearly three hours. 

"I'm all right," he said, "but I need you to go and fetch Professor Longbottom, can you do that?"

"Professor, you -- your mouth is bleeding."

"I know," he said, hand still up to stop her coming closer, "I've had a fall, I'm okay, but I do need a bit of help, so if you could get the Professor..."

She set her jaw determinedly and began to cross the last few stairs towards him. "I can help you, let me --"

"No! No, Hanna, please, please step back."

Merlin, he was sorry she was seeing him like this. What a bloody nightmare. Would he be sacked for traumatizing students?

"All right," she said, "I'm going for help." She turned, then hesitated. "Here," she blurted, "my mum used to do this when I wasn't feeling well." She flicked her wand and suddenly the air was filled with huge, soapy bubbles, each of them containing a soft white glow, like starlight. Then she darted back down the stairs.

Harry blinked at the bubbles floating gently all around him, and his throat clenched. He was so touched by the gesture, so moved by the simple beauty of a magic that had no purpose other than to please, that he could feel his own furious magic begin to calm and quiet within him. It settled back beneath the blanket of pain and closed its eyes, lulled. This was the closest thing to relief Harry had felt since waking up that morning. 

"Ten points to Gryffindor," he said aloud. Just this once, he could break his own rules. 

Soon, much sooner than he'd expected considering how far Herbology was, he heard footsteps thudding quickly up the staircase -- not quite hurrying but not taking their time either. He knew immediately, with a deep sinking instinct, that it was not Neville. Neville's footsteps were intimately familiar to him, they were part of the soundtrack of his formative years, he'd know them anywhere, and this was not them.

Please, Harry thought, please, please, please don't let it be --

Malfoy appeared on the stair. All Hanna's beautiful bubbles burst at once. He paused when he saw Harry, his mouth tightening, then continued up until he was standing before him, so tall that Harry didn't have to energy to look higher than his chest. Slowly, gracefully, Malfoy sank to his knees, until he was crouched in front of Harry and looking him straight in the face. His eyes were blue as an ice field. 

"Potter," he said. "Rough morning?"

Harry felt his nostrils flare, and he clenched his jaw, both hands curling into fists. He'd had lots of truly shite days in his thirty-one years, but this one was really a contender for a top slot. "I asked Hanna to get Neville."

"She was frightened and I was closest," Malfoy said. "Came whirling into my classroom like a banshee screaming for the dead."

"My wand's upstairs, or I would've sent for someone myself. I'm sorry you left class for this."

Malfoy took a sharp breath through his pierced nose. "Don't be an idiot. What happened? You've fallen and you can't get up?"

The curse thudded in Harry's joints. He was in so much fucking pain, was so fucking tired, he had no energy for Malfoy's taunts and insults, no energy even to muster a reply that wouldn't humiliate himself further. He nodded.

"Can you stand?"

Miserably, Harry shook his head.

"Why? Is it pain or weakness?"

"It's not -- it's not _weakness_. I was _cursed._ "

Malfoy's eyes flashed. "I'm not insulting your masculinity, Potter, I'm asking a purely physical question about what's keeping you from standing. Pain? Or weakness?"

Harry took off his glasses with a shaking hand and rubbed his eyes. "Pain."

Malfoy did not look happy about this answer. In fact, he was taking far less pleasure in Harry's misery than Harry would have expected. He took a vial out of his robe and showed it to Harry. The contents were purple and sparkling and Harry caught a faint whiff of blueberry pie. 

"This is an emergency pain tonic," Malfoy said. "It's extremely powerful and extremely dangerous, so I need to explain it before I can administer it, and you need to give me verbal confirmation and consent that you understand. All right?"

Harry was somewhat startled by this side of Malfoy, serious and professional. He nodded. 

"Verbal, Potter."

"Yes."

"It eradicates pain completely, and I do mean completely, for about thirty minutes. Sufferers of chronic pain tend to like it quite a lot, but I advise you not to enjoy the experience any more than necessary, because if you take more than one dose between two full moons, you'll drop dead pretty much instantly. Understand?"

"Yes."

"I've portioned out this dose myself," Malfoy said. "Too little is useless; too much could kill you right here. I have complete faith in my own skill and believe I've portioned it perfectly, but I understand if you don't share that belief and choose not to take it. I give you my absolute word as a Healer that I have only your best interest in mind, despite whatever... whatever lies between us."

Harry narrowed his eyes. "You're not a Healer."

"I am, actually. I was trained in France, after -- after the war. I can show you my certification record if you'd like."

Harry, because he was a paranoid bastard, nodded, and Malfoy held out his wand and let a ribbon of text spool out from the tip. Harry had seen enough forged certifications to know that this one was legitimate, even though most of it was in French. Healer Malfoy. Would wonders never cease? 

"If you consent to the potion, you will have thirty minutes in which you will feel no pain whatsoever. It sounds nice, I know, but it's also dangerous, because pain is a good communicator. Any damage you do to yourself is still damage, whether or not you feel it, so although you're going to want to move quickly, it is imperative that you move as you normally would. Understand?"

"Yes."

"So: emergency use only, don't enjoy it too much, move very carefully. If you do not trust me and choose not to take the potion, I can levitate you up the stairs instead, but I imagine that scenario isn't ideal for you, either, and would probably hurt quite a lot. Or --" Malfoy took a deep breath. "Or I can go get Longbottom and he can deal with you. Take a moment and decide."

Harry put his head in his hand. This had to be a test, didn't it? Say yes, and he'd be giving Malfoy permission to poison him. The answer should be easy: get Longbottom. But Harry was in so much pain -- and had been for so long. The thought of even thirty minutes without it was a temptation greater than anything the Mirror of Erised could've shown him. Would he risk his life for it?

"Harry," Malfoy said, and suddenly his hand was on Harry's locked and outstretched knee, his touch featherlight, so brief Harry thought he might've imagined it. Startled, Harry looked up. Those blue, blue eyes were fixed on his. "I know you have no reason to trust me," Malfoy said. "But I swear -- I swear that right now, I'm only trying to help you. I'm not interested in hurting you any further."

Harry wanted to believe him, he wanted it so badly -- and fuck it. He decided to simply do so. 

"I'll take the potion," Harry said, and Malfoy handed him the vial. It had a glass twist-off cap rather than a cork, and Harry pawed uselessly at it with his clumsy fingers, tried switching hands, nearly dropped it, and handed it back to Malfoy. "Can you open it?" he said. "I hurt my hand -- just now -- when I fell."

If Malfoy had any reason to believe this was a lie, he showed no sign, just twisted off the cap and handed it back. The smell of blueberry pie grew stronger, sweeter, almost cloying, and Harry closed his eyes and downed the potion. 

The result was instantaneous. 

He was in pain, and then he wasn't: hell, and then heaven. The change was so disorienting that his muscles briefly gave out and he began to sag like a rag doll before he caught himself. Malfoy was right, it was like no pain potion he'd ever had before -- the pain wasn't dulled, wasn't calmed, it was simply vanished. The relief of it was like a tidal wave, so enormous and all-encompassing that, to Harry's deep embarrassment, his eyes filled with tears. He visored his eyes with a hand and turned away, and nothing about movement hurt, it was as fluid and natural as it had used to be, back in the Before of this never-ending After. It felt so good not to feel bad. He drew a shuddering breath, thumbing at a tear that had forced its way onto his cheek. He couldn't look at Malfoy. He felt flayed open. 

He heard Malfoy stand, but he didn't speak, just gave Harry a few minutes' space to get himself under control, a few minutes just to sit there and feel blessed nothing. Tears kept leaking stubbornly out, but eventually they subsided, and Harry's ragged breath calmed, and Malfoy said, "Twenty-four minutes. Let's try and get you up."

Harry began to stand, reveling at how easy it was even with his Locked leg, and Malfoy said sharply, "Careful! Careful. Is that a Locking charm? I'm going to take it off for a moment, just to demonstrate something, all right?"

A moment later, Harry's knee buckled. Malfoy caught him in surprisingly strong arms, holding him for long enough to right him, then reinstated the charm. 

"You see, the damage, the weakness, it's still there, but you have no pain to warn you about it. So move very cautiously or you'll have more to deal with later."

"This potion is incredible," Harry blurted. 

Malfoy nodded. He didn't look proud or smug. He looked... sad. "Come on," he said. "You usually lean on the banister, yes? Do it even if you don't feel you need to."

Harry had a keen sense-memory of climbing these bloody stairs day in and day out, and it wasn't hard to approximate his daily haul, leaning heavily on the banister, going up carefully step-by-step even though it felt ridiculous to try and accommodate a pain he didn't feel. Malfoy went behind him, not hovering exactly. 

"Ridiculous the Floo's taking so long," Malfoy muttered. "How you've been doing this every day, I don't know."

"Is that -- are you actually feeling sorry for me?"

"No, I'm just disgusted with the bureaucracy around this place. It shouldn't be this sodding difficult to get you better accommodations. Beauxbatons is a hundred percent accessible in every corner, they've had wizards bending over backwards to figure out spells to avoid things like stairs. You want to know why there are no disabled students at Hogwarts? They go abroad for their education."

Harry stopped. "No. Is that true?"

"Keep going -- slowly! Yes, it's true, though we're only talking one or two students a year. Just because these types of -- of maladies -- are rare in the wizarding world does not mean that they don't occur."

"But children..." Harry said. He was working something out and not liking where it took him. "Only powerful dark magic can make unHealable wounds. Who would -- who would curse a child?"

"You of all people, Potter, should know the depths of evil that can exist in this world. Careful!" He hissed the last word as they reached the top step and Harry began to stride in the direction of his rooms. But how could he be careful? It felt so good to move like this, to move as he once had, unthinking, letting his body carry him instinctually.

"Let me just --"

Malfoy grabbed his shoulder, the bad one, and Harry didn't feel a thing. "Potter, what don't you understand? The way you move will still have consequences on your body. I imagine you've wreaked enough havoc on it with whatever sludge you brewed up the other night, if you don't slow down you'll be recovering in bed for days, and I know you don't want that."

Harry did not. Reluctantly, he slowed. Then he pulled up sharp. "Wait -- you knew? You knew it was me who -- who took those things from your office?"

"Of course. As always, you’re not nearly as clever as you think you are."

"How did you know?"

"You took all the ingredients for a standard St. Mungo's curse-dampening pain potion, and then you left the potions classroom an absolute mess."

"I didn't, I cleaned up!"

"You tidied, there's a difference. Anyway, where do you think you're going?"

"Er -- my rooms?"

"Absolutely not, we're going to the hospital wing. We only have eighteen minutes left until this wears off, and we need to be somewhere we can keep an eye on you when it does."

Harry swallowed. He hated the reminder that the pain would be back. 

Malfoy took Harry's bad arm to help him along, and though it didn't hurt a bit, Harry thought of Malfoy's warning and said, "If you're that bent on helping, the other side'll be more useful."

Malfoy released the bad arm and came around to Harry's good right side, and Harry let him take some of the weight from his bad leg. Good leg, bad leg, good arm, bad arm, who made these moralistic judgments on innocent limbs? 

"The pain," Harry said. "Will it be like earlier?"

"Hopefully not. I brewed an _acceptable_ version of the pain potion you should have been taking, and that will take the edge off. I assume you had an unfortunate experience with your own disgusting concoction?"

Harry hmmmed an affirmative. 

"Do you have any left?"

"Thirty diamond-plated vials worth," Harry said, and mustered up enough energy to try a grin at Malfoy, who did not grin back, though he didn't scowl, either. "Sorry about that, by the way, I didn't know."

"And did your potion work?"

"Erm -- not as such. It only lasted an hour, and the withdrawal..." He shook his head.

"Why on earth didn't you come to me? I assume you have a prescription."

Harry didn't look at him, because he was currently leaning heavily on his arm and if he'd turned their faces would have been far too close for comfort. "In case you haven't noticed, I'm a bit paranoid."

"You thought I'd – what -- poison you?"

"Yes, or -- or make fun of me, or... Merlin, it sounds stupid said out loud."

Malfoy was quiet. Then he said, "There's quite a lot to mock you for, Potter. But being hurt... No Healer would ever mock a person for an injury or illness."

"Well, I didn't know you were a Healer, did I?"

"Also," Malfoy went on, as if determined to get something out, "I haven't forgotten that you saved my life. In the Room of Requirement. So -- I owe you my life. I wouldn't try and take yours."

It was very odd to be so close to Malfoy as he said this. Harry could feel the shifting muscle of his arm, could feel the warmth of his body, smell the slightly woodsy, ambered scent of him, probably some posh cologne that Harry couldn't help but like. "All right," he said. "Look, I have this prescription for pain potion, think you could help me out?"

He felt rather than saw Malfoy smile. "I think that could be arranged."


	4. Chapter 4

In the end, Harry was in the hospital wing for a night and day. That made three days of classes missed, he'd have to reconstruct his whole syllabus around his own stupidity, if he was even allowed to keep teaching. Neville came to see him that evening, pale-faced and guilty and wringing his hands. 

"Harry, I should've --"

"Neville, this isn't your fault, I've just got shite luck and a shite body."

Then, both of them at once, "Please don't tell Hermione --"

Harry laughed weakly and Neville managed a tremulous smile. "They're fastracking the inter-castle Floo network," Neville said. "Should be ready by next week. The Daily Prophet wrote an absolutely scathing article, it --"

"No, no, please don't tell me the Daily Prophet knows about this."

"Not about -- what happened to you on the stairs, but yeah, they know you've come to teach here and they know Hogwarts has a hundred staircases --"

"A hundred forty two --

"-- A hundred forty two staircases, and they got a few interviews with students saying they've seen how difficult it is for you, and --"

"Stop," Harry said. "Student interviews? Please tell me you’re making this up."

Neville shook his head, eyes round. 

"Oh god," Harry said, thudding back against his cushions. "The post is going to be mental."

Sure enough, hundreds of letters arrived at his sickbed, outraged on his behalf -- one, predictably, from Molly Weasley, threatening to come to Hogwarts and fix things herself, but mostly from strangers of all genders who either wanted to mother him, fuck him, or both at once. There were also a handful of notes from curse-injured wizards who expressed their sympathy and said how glad they were that people were finally paying attention. Those were nice -- but less nice was the follow-up headline, _Potter's Crusade for Disability Rights!_

Harry, it seemed, was destined to be an unwilling symbol for the rest of his life. 

He had a steady stream of student visitors, which was so embarrassing he had to beg Madame Pomfrey to stop admitting them, and a steady stream of faculty, as well. But of all his visitors, three of them stood out. 

"Dad sends his love," Hanna said, sliding into the chair by his bed.

"Hanna," Harry said, jolting awake from a potioned doze. 

"Are you okay?"

"Yes, I'm fine. I -- did Madame Pomfrey let you in?"

"Snuck past her while she was watering her jade plant," Hanna said, looking him up and down. "You look much better than last time I saw you."

Harry winced. "I'm -- I wish you hadn't seen me like that in the first place. I feel terrible about it."

"I don't!" she said fiercely. "If I hadn't come looking, you might've -- well, it wouldn't have been very nice for you, would it?"

It occurred to Harry, for the first time, to say, "Thank you for that. And thanks for fetching Mal -- Professor Malfoy."

"Ooooh, you should've seen him when I told him you were hurt," she said gleefully. "He dropped an entire cauldron of StoneRot potion, they still haven't figured out how to patch the hole in the floor."

"Did he?" Harry found himself oddly pleased by this. Then he said, "Hanna? Would you -- would you mind teaching me the charm for those bubbles?"

She beamed. "You liked them?"

"Yes, very much."

He picked the charm up quickly, and as soon as she'd gone, he murmured, "Astribulla," and filled the air with them, shining and glowing and drifting gently, bouncing off the sheets that served as walls to cordon off his little bed. He heard Madame Pomfrey talking to someone outside, heard her say, "Chloé Barnes? Sorry, dear, if you're not on the list, I can't let you in."

Harry sat up so quickly that pain shot through his body, and all the bubbles popped. He called, "Poppy? It's okay, let her through."

A moment later, Chloé Barnes crept into his room and stood at the foot of his bed. She was so small, such a child, with enormous, watery eyes and a trembling mouth. She clutched a homemade get-well card in her hand, covered with flowers she'd clearly drawn herself. 

"Hullo, Professor," she said. "I only wanted -- to give you --" She darted forward and put the card on his bed, then turned to flee.

"Wait!" he called after her. "Wait, Chloé. Come here. Sit."

With effort, she did so, clutching her hands together like a tiny grown-up. 

"I'm glad you've come. I've been wanting to talk to you. I wanted to say --" he swallowed with some difficulty. "I wanted to say that I'm sorry about your dad. I didn't... I didn't want it to be like that."

Her lips trembled. She said, "It's okay. He shouldn't have done what he did."

"No," Harry agreed. "But -- it's okay to love him anyway, and to be sad he's gone. If it were my dad, I'd be very sad, no matter what."

Her eyes filled with tears and she hung her head, clearly trying not to cry. "You wouldn't be mad at me?" she said. "If I were sad about him?"

"No!" he said. "No, never. You can be sad about whatever makes you sad."

She didn't say anything, just sat by his bed for a while, staring at her knees. Then she rubbed her eyes, stood, and said, "I hope you feel better."

"I will," he promised. "I'll see you in class on Monday."

Whether the conversation had helped or not remained to be seen, but he propped her card up at his bedside and hoped it had brought her a modicum of relief. 

His third visitor of note was Malfoy, who swept in with a scowl and immediately launched into a long, very academic-sounding speech about Hellsbane and Daddy Longlegs venom and time-release and Merlin knew what else, until finally Harry had to stop him and say, "Malfoy, I don't understand a bloody word you're saying."

"I've tweaked the St. Mungo's recipe and made you a new potion," Malfoy said shortly. "It has the same curse-dampening power but it also targets pain of the joints, and it's a twelve-hour formula that doesn't need food as a binder, so you won't have to plan everything around snack time anymore. Here's a week's supply, test it out and we'll arrange a meeting next week to discuss it. I ask that you keep a detailed record of your reaction to it, both positive and negative, all right? It should be more effective, but it also might have some new side effects, and I need to know what they are."

"I -- all right. Thanks."

Malfoy took out a small notebook and said, "I'll pencil you in for a 6pm next Friday. I'll owl you a reminder on Thursday."

"Friday at 6, okay."

"It may not taste very nice."

"That's -- I don't mind."

And with a flap of blue robes, Malfoy was gone again. 

:::

On Monday, Harry had the delightful experience of making an entire classroom of first years scream when he staggered out of the new Floo system in the classroom's hitherto unused fireplace. He patted soot from his robes and limped to his desk, moving carefully, not eager to fall again anytime soon. But Malfoy's potion was so far proving excellent; he had more range of motion in his hip and was able to lift his arm higher than he had in recent memory.

Unfortunately, everyone had questions about his well-publicized stay in the hospital wing. 

"Hi," he said brightly. "Sorry to've missed class. Hope you took advantage and slept late for a few days."

Someone raised her hand. "Is it true you were attacked by a troll?"

"Er -- recently? No. Recently, I was attacked by a staircase."

"A cursed staircase?"

Harry pushed hair out of his eyes. "No, Jenny, just a regular staircase."

This news was met with confused silence, and Harry took the opportunity to launch into the lesson. For the first time, Chloé Barnes raised her hand to very quietly answer one of his questions, and while it wasn't much, it felt like progress. 

In his third year class, a very loud boy named Callum said, "Professor, I'm Muggle-born, and I came out with one leg shorter than the other."

Harry blinked at him. "Oh?"

"Yeah, but when I came to Hogwarts they fixed me up the first day. See?" He stood to demonstrate the height equality of his legs. "How come they can't fix you?"

"Good question," Harry said. It was a terrible question. "Anyone know the answer?"

He knew it would be Hanna even before she raised her hand. "Some curses are cast to be unHealable, like, on purpose. It's illegal and it's mad difficult to get right, but some people do it anyway."

"Yes," said Galen Parkinson, "And _some_ people can deflect unHealable curses before they hit."

It was deeply uncharitable of Harry to think of any student as a twit, but he thought it anyway. "Yes," he said as patiently as he could, "and hopefully that's what we'll learn in this class. Moving on, please, and let's remember what I said about personal questions."

Overall, however, his students seemed glad to have him back. The only real hiccup was during his fifth period, right after he'd taken his customary slow lope around the room, enjoying the new flexibility in his leg. He sat back behind his desk, still lecturing on defensive wand-motions, and then --

"Sorry," he said, yawning, "One moment," and put his head on the desk and fell instantly asleep. 

He awoke a minute later to find all his students clustered around him, someone's hand on his shoulder, someone else yelling for help, someone else tossing water on him. 

"Stop," he said, spluttering and wet, "Stop, I'm fine, no, don't call for help, please, I just got tired."

Slowly, the classroom was restored to order. When it happened again the next day, he awoke to find only a few people up and panicking, and by the third day, he awoke to find everyone in their seats, patiently waiting for his sixty-second nap to finish. 

:::

"Curious," said Malfoy at their 6pm meeting on Friday. He was slouched elegantly behind his desk, one ankle on his knee, showing off surprisingly bright orange socks. Even his socks looked expensive, somehow. "And it was the same time every day?"

"Four twenty pm, clockwork," Harry said. "Out for a full minute, then bang, I'm up, like nothing ever happened."

"And that's the only side effect?"

"Only one I noticed. Otherwise it's -- well, it's been really excellent, actually. Thank you."

Malfoy looked genuinely pleased, even allowing himself a small smile, no hint of a sneer. "I'm glad it's worked out so far. I'll fiddle with it and try to find out what's inducing the narcolepsy, it might be the poppy..."

"Honestly, one minute of napping's a fair trade for the rest," Harry said. 

The clock struck half six and Malfoy glanced at it, then at Harry. "Well," he said. "To dinner?"

Harry, caught off guard, stuttered, "Oh -- I mean -- yes."

He hadn't taken dinner in the Great Hall since the first week, too tired and achy by the end of the day to want to be around people. But he felt not bad at the moment, actually, potion still going strong, so why not?

"They rigged my fireplace," Malfoy said, gesturing. "So we can take the Floo. I expect that's been a welcome change for you, has it?"

Harry was still so attuned for insult that for a moment he felt himself bristling. Which was silly, because -- "Yes, it really has."

Malfoy made room in the fireplace as Harry approached the green flames, and a moment later they were blendered away to the Great Hall. Harry staggered a bit as they landed, like he always did, and he was surprised to feel Malfoy's hand under his elbow, steadying him. Another hand was at his back, and it stayed there as he got his balance and stumbled out into the busy Great Hall, where dinner was already underway. Heads turned towards him as always, whispers followed, but he was far less of a sensation now that he had so many of these students in class. They were less interested in Harry Potter now that they knew him as Professor Potter, which made him inordinately happy. Some of them called hello to him as he passed -- and many of them also called out to Malfoy. Not only Slytherins, but students from every house, cheerily waving and saying, "Hi Professor Malfoy!" and "Professor Malfoy, I found six blue-slimed slugs, d'you want them?" and "Professor, did you grade my essay yet?"

Malfoy, Harry realized, with absolute shock, was _popular._ Students _liked_ him. And he wasn't sneering at any of them. He wasn't smiling, either, but then, Malfoy almost never smiled, but there was something nevertheless warm about his face, something crinkly about his eyes -- and was it possible that Malfoy, like McGonagall, was a not-a-smile smiler? How had Harry never noticed this?

They reached the faculty table and Harry took the seat next to Neville, while Malfoy slid in across from them. Harry adjusted himself a bit, stretching out his leg, and felt his knee bump up against Malfoy's. His first instinct was to yank it away and apologize for letting his Mudblood filth touch Malfoy's pureblood robes, but for one thing, he couldn't move that fast, and for another, Malfoy seemed unbothered. Experimentally, Harry left his knee where it was. 

For some reason this made it very hard to concentrate on what other people were saying.

"Hmm?" Harry said, idly attempting to saw a piece of rather tough steak with the edge of his fork. It had turned out to be quite difficult to eat foods that needed cutting if you only had working hand. 

"I asked if you were listening," McGonagall said, pucker-mouthed. "I see that you weren't."

"Sorry," Harry said, refocusing. "No, I am. Just a bit tired. Say it again?"

Her expression softened and he felt guilty playing the invalid card the one night he actually didn't need it. He gave up on his fork and swapped it for his wand, performing a neat little charm that cut his entire plate of food into bite sized pieces -- including, unfortunately, the napkin that got caught in the crossfire. Little bits of linen flew everywhere. 

"Ah, sorry," Harry winced, hoping no one thought to wonder why he needed a cutting charm. He thought he could feel Malfoy watching him across the table.

"I wanted to know," McGonagall said, picking a piece of napkin out of her broccoli casserole, "if you'd referee for Quidditch this season. You've been requested."

Any good mood Harry had been courting suddenly plummeted. "Love to," he said, trying to channel some of Malfoy's coolness, "but I can't fly."

"Nimbus has a new line of comfort brooms," Professor Soobs said in her monotonous voice. "Cushioning charms, stay-put charms, support charms."

"Yes, I hear it's like flying on an armchair," McGonagall said. 

Harry didn't want to fly on a bloody armchair. He wanted to fly on a broom. He missed it like he'd miss breathing, the swoop up, the plummet down, the swerves, the wind, the thrill. He hadn't been able to stomach Quidditch since he'd been cursed, and now he was supposed to armchair around like an ancient witch, blowing a whistle at the nimble bodies who could dart and soar to their heart's content.

"I've got to pass," he said. "Not the job for me."

"The students will be disappointed."

"Well, tough," Harry said. "Life is disappointing."

He didn't mean to say it aloud, and at the shocked faces of his colleagues he felt instantly ashamed. He thought he felt the slight press of Malfoy's knee against his own -- a sign of reprimand? Sympathy? Was he imagining it?

"Sorry," he said, rubbing his eyes beneath his glasses. "Sorry. I'm just --" a bitter washed-up git "--tired. Thank the students for the offer, Professor, and give them my apologies." He pushed back from the table and slapped a hand on Neville's shoulder, leveraging himself up with a forced smile. "I'm going to put myself to bed, I think."

"Potter," McGonagall said, her fingers closing around the wrist of his bad arm, and he stopped, effectively tethered. "I didn't mean to offend."

"You didn't," he assured her. And it was true, he wasn't offended. He was just -- sad. "Why not ask Mal - Professor Malfoy, he used to be quite a good Seeker back in the day."

Malfoy looked surprised and caught-out, and Harry gave him a cheeky grin as he made his way back to the Floo. It cheered him a bit to think of elegant Malfoy swooping about with a whistle. 

He stepped into the flames and said, "Harry Potter's bedroom," and a gut-churning moment later he was spit out into his room. He had a stack of essays to grade and he settled himself into his armchair, pillow beneath his knee, glass of firewhiskey in hand, eyes on the parchments, mind in the sky. 

:::

"Did you hear," Neville asked him over lunch the next day, "that Draco's been getting Howlers every morning? It's why he's never got any mail at breakfast, he has it delivered to his room so he doesn't scare the students."

"From who?" Harry said. "His mum?" In his experience, it was mostly mums that sent Howlers.

"No," Neville said. "No one's been able to track them yet."

Harry spoke around a mouthful of hot tomato soup. "What do they say?"

"I only heard them twice, but it was the same message both times." Neville put on what he clearly thought was a spooky voice, but mostly sounded as if he was trying not to sneeze. " _BLOOD TRAITOR. YOU WILL JOIN YOUR FATHER._ "

"Join your -- but Lucius is dead. So you're telling me Malfoy's been getting death threats?"

"I suppose you could say that," Neville said. 

"Blood traitor," Harry repeated. "How on earth is Malfoy a blood traitor?"

Neville looked at him. "I've told you, he's not like he was, Harry. I think he's put in a lot of work to leave that part of his life behind."

"And everyone who suffered from his bigotry? Have they managed to put it behind them? Have Luna and Hermione forgotten being tortured in his house, do you think? Is Dobby going to pop back to life because Malfoy's suddenly feeling a bit sorry?"

Neville shrugged. "If you'll remember, he was quite awful to me, as well. I'm not saying it's been easy, forgiving him. But I think I have."

Harry took another bite of soup, then pushed his bowl away. His appetite was gone. "I'll give you this," he said. "He hasn't poisoned me yet."

"I guess sometimes that's the best we can hope for of anyone," Neville said, smiling. 

:::

Malfoy's next batch of potions put Harry into a sixty-second nap at four-ten instead of four-twenty, but his students had grown used to it by now and it was at most a minor inconvenience. He'd been at Hogwarts a month already, September nearly gone, and he was settling into the rhythm of things -- the hectic schoolweek, and then the slow weekends spent grading papers, writing to Ron and Hermione, or going out to sit by the lake with a notebook and a jug of pumpkin juice. 

He had spent a pleasant few hours inventing an enchantment that let him manipulate the ground, sculpting it into little hills and ridges, and he was able to prop himself up perfectly to his comfort, his back and head pillowed by one grassy mound, another beneath his knees, another supporting his bad arm so he could prop his hand in his lap and hold his book down. An earthen recliner. There was a spot on the grounds he particularly liked even though it was a bit of a hike: thick, soft grass in a copse of trees, far from where the students tended to gather and with a perfect view of the vast, crystalline waters of the lake. There was a little sandy beach below where sometimes Harry saw footprints, though he'd yet to see another person. 

He sat there now on the last Sunday in September, revising some ideas he had for a new Defense Against the Dark Arts textbook. It was just a silly side-project to keep himself occupied, but he enjoyed the work, enjoyed thinking through the problems of how to explain things and in what order. Boggarts were a natural foundation for Dementors, but what would be a suitable link between the two, something that could be taught in the fifth year, perhaps? 

The day was hot, the air still, the lake serene. Harry felt himself getting drowsy and he dropped his quill so he could pick up his wand, guiding the earth beneath him to lower him down into a more supine position. Perfect white fluffy clouds drifted sheeplike across the sky. He felt sleepy and comfortable and just this side of too-hot in jeans and a button-up shirt, and he'd taken off his shoes to feel the soft grass beneath his feet. He'd just nodded off when he heard someone humming. 

Instantly he was awake, wand at the ready. Someone was coming through the little path in the trees, someone in blue shorts, their pale legs long and lean, with a white shirt and pale white face. Draco Malfoy, a red towel slung around his neck, pulled up short when he saw Harry. 

"Oh," he said. He looked around, as if he'd found himself somewhere unexpected. "I didn't -- no one's ever here."

"I know," said Harry. "That's why I come."

They stared at each other for a minute and Harry registered the red towel.

"Were you going to _swim_?" he asked.

"Yes," said Malfoy. "It's very good exercise."

"Do you do that often, come here and swim?"

"Most mornings," said Malfoy. "The cold helps wake me up. Got a late start today, as you can see. It's nearly three."

"Well," Harry said, beginning to gather his things, "don't let me stop you, I can --"

"No, stay," Malfoy said. "I'll be out there, anyway." He gestured to the lake, then eyed Harry. "That's an interesting -- arrangement. The way the ground's holding you like that, how did you do it?"

Harry looked down at himself. "It's a -- erm, a mixture of a ceramics charm for sculpting bowls, a landscaping charm for trimming topiary, and a bit of snow-plowing."

Malfoy raised an eyebrow. "Do you mean to say you made it up?"

"Yeah," Harry said defensively, expecting some jibe, but Malfoy only cocked his head. 

"Show me how it works?"

"Oh -- well, all right. Erm -- _sculp_ aratri!" Harry waved his wand so the ground swelled upwards into a chair and he was sitting more or less upright, and then, with another flick, the chair tipped forward to help him stand. He lowered his wand, and the ground flattened out again. "Like that," he said, self-conscious, and uncomfortably aware of his bare feet.

"Potter," said Malfoy. "That's not half bad."

Harry had no idea how to react to this unexpected compliment. "Okay," he said. "I mean, thanks."

"Do you want to come in?" Malfoy was not a blurter-outer, and he did not blurt now. But Harry could tell he had not expected to say this. "In the lake, I mean. It's so hot out."

As soon as Malfoy suggested it, Harry _did_ want to go in the lake. His fringe was sweat-damp and his t-shirt was sticking to his lower back, and absolutely nothing sounded better than leaping into the pure ice-cold water, where gravity wouldn't pull him down and it wouldn't matter if his leg didn't hold him well. But his shoulder -- his shoulder would make it very difficult to swim. He could wade in and float, probably, but then there was the idea of taking off his shirt in front of Malfoy, whose broad shoulders and strong arms would be on full display. Harry imagined the rest of his torso was just as impressive. Harry hadn't really looked in the mirror recently, but he knew he was thinner than he'd been a few years ago, and his time in the Ministry had left him with an unflattering set of scars even before he'd been cursed. The curse scars alone were horrible to behold, shiny and raised and so clearly made from dark magic. 

But why should Harry care what Malfoy thought of his body? It's not as if he'd be looking, would he? Certainly not like Harry knew he'd be looking at Malfoy, but that was only because Malfoy was gorgeous; anyone would look. And the water looked so cold, so inviting...

Harry realized he was taking a very long time to answer, but Malfoy hadn't moved, was waiting patiently for Harry to sort out whatever the hell he was trying to sort out. 

"Yeah," Harry said. "A swim sounds nice."

He followed Malfoy to the little sandy beach, unsurprised to notice that his footprints matched the footprints Harry had seen earlier. Malfoy lay down his red towel and shucked off his shoes and then seemed to hesitate, fingers fiddling with the buttons of his long-sleeved white shirt, which looked as expensive as everything he wore. If Harry didn't know better, he'd think Malfoy was self-conscious, but what on earth did he have to be self-conscious about, especially compared to Harry? 

He understood a moment later -- and understood, too, why he'd never seen Malfoy in a t-shirt. 

The Dark Mark was still branded on his arm, looking brand-new and almost inflamed, the skin around it pink and swollen. Harry couldn't hide how the sight affected him: his whole body went rigid, the old fury sweeping through his veins. 

"Sorry," Malfoy muttered. "It's -- I've tried everything to get it off, but... Well, everyone regrets the tattoos of their youth, don't they?"

Harry stared. "I think your attempts at humor are even scarier than that mark."

Malfoy huffed and turned away, and Harry hesitated. Was he really about to go swimming, for fun, with a Death Eater? But Malfoy wasn't a Death Eater anymore, was he? He'd just said he wanted to get rid of the mark -- but he _would_ say that, wouldn't he. You didn't go around admitting to being a Death Eater anymore, not unless you were in the right circles. But he thought of the Howlers, _blood traitor_... 

As if reading his mind, Malfoy said, "I suppose I should tell you. The things I used to believe, about bloodright, and magical superiority, all of it... I don't believe those things anymore." He'd turned towards the water and the smooth, muscled planes of his back glowed in the sun. 

"You mean, you gave up being a bigoted prick?"

There was silence, then Malfoy said, "The bigot part, at least. I hope."

"What changed your mind?" Harry said. He could hear the anger in his voice, but he couldn't help it, the wound ran so deep. "When it stopped being fashionable? When you realized the tides had turned and you weren't in power anymore?"

"Yes," Malfoy said. His voice was steady. "I won't lie. That started it. But I also began to wake up, to grow up. I looked around and realized that everyone I knew -- everyone I loved, even -- was miserable and afraid. That's what hate does to people, it keeps them unhappy and terrified. If it had been you, that day with the fiend's fire... I wouldn't have saved you. I would've let you die."

Harry had known this on some level, but it was strangely painful to hear it admitted out loud. Malfoy still hadn't turned -- he was addressing the lake in front of him. 

"Your ego's big enough, Potter," Malfoy continued. "So don't let this go to your head. But I'd always thought of myself as cowardly -- and was always told I was cowardly -- because I'd never been able to bring myself to kill anyone outright. I always thought I wasn't brave enough to kill. The Room of Requirement, when you saved me even though you nearly died doing it -- it got me thinking that maybe I'd been wrong, about bravery. That maybe killing is in fact more cowardly, and mercy's the hard bit." 

Harry had absolutely no idea how to respond to this. Frantically, he tried to think what Hermione would want him to say. _Tell him how his words make you feel, Harry._ He cleared his throat. "That makes me feel --" he started. "I mean, I -- good. That you've -- changed your mind." If he really had, if all this were true.

Finally, Malfoy turned. "Also," he said, "I don't know if you've heard, but my mother cut off all her hair, married a Muggle woman, and is now living in a lesbian commune in Greece, so -- there's also that."

Harry let out a peal of surprised laughter. "No."

"Oh, yes." Malfoy gave Harry a brief smile. "Anyway. I'm going in. Take your time."

With that, he took two decisive strides forward, and dove. 

Harry watched him swim out, as graceful on water as he was on land, then turned to the matter of his own undressing. He'd process what Malfoy had said later; maybe. For now, he unzipped his jeans and then cast about for somewhere to sit, but the sandy beach was empty. He used his earth-shaping charm to swell some sand into a semblance of a seat, and managed to get his jeans off. Next was his shirt, and he looked to make sure Malfoy wouldn't see the unbuttoning charm he'd learned at St. Mungo's, all the buttons wriggling magically free of their holes as Harry waited. His shoulder always made this part difficult, but he struggled free of his shirt without too much hassle, then folded his wand in his clothes and stood. He was just in his red Gryffindor boxers, now, and he made his way through the shifting sand, careful not to lose his footing, careful not to look down at the mess of his leg. 

The scars from the curses were terrible, thick and ropy and shiny, and they still moved sometimes like snakes winding under his skin. His kneecap was obscured by scar tissue, his hip no better, though his shoulder and the joints of his fingers weren't as bad. They blended with the other, minor scars he'd picked up over the years -- little starbursts from hexes, jagged blast-marks from jinxes, slash-marks and burns and whatever else. 

"Come on," Malfoy called. "Scared of the cold?"

Harry had been concentrating on keeping his balance, and he glanced up. Malfoy had swum back and was standing ankle-deep in the water, watching him. His own skin was smooth and unmarked and Harry felt a glimmer of rage that faded quickly into something else, something like admiration. Malfoy had such beautiful joints. Maybe this was an odd thing to notice, but Harry'd had to think more about joints than most people, and Malfoy's were without a doubt excellent. Shoulders thick with muscle, solid wrists with a delicate protrusion of bone, perfect kneecaps under muscled thighs, curved ankles. He couldn't help but stare.

Malfoy, for his part, did no more than glance at Harry, and Harry felt both relieved and obscurely disappointed. He knew he was nothing to look at, not anymore, but shouldn't Malfoy at least be curious? About the scars, anyway -- most people were. The complete lack of interest was disheartening. Which was a strange feeling, because usually Harry hated to be stared at. 

Harry began to make his careful way forward, relishing the feeling of the fresh water closing around his ankles, his shins, his aching knee, his thighs. Malfoy went in again with him, some meters away, and a prickle on the back of his neck caused Harry to glance his way. They were both waist-deep in the blue water, and --

There it was. 

Malfoy _had_ been looking. 

Maybe it was only morbid curiosity about his scars, maybe it was just the natural urge to compare one body to another, but Harry could have sworn that something in Malfoy's gaze, something about the way it lingered on his shoulders and dipped to his stomach was... appreciative. And that shouldn't make Harry feel so damn pleased, but it did. 

Smiling to himself, he took a few more steps, feeling lighter and lighter the deeper he went. When he was chest deep he took a breath and then submerged himself, holding his glasses with his good hand, bad arm positioned carefully against his side. It was so cool down here, so dark, so quiet, and Harry felt a little quiver of pure physical pleasure. A rarity, to feel suddenly so happy in his body. When he came back up, Malfoy was so close Harry could see the water droplets on his eyelashes, and he jumped in surprise. 

"Boo," said Malfoy. He was, to Harry's surprise, grinning outright -- perhaps the first real smile Harry'd seen on him. "I'm going to swim a few laps. Will you -- will you be all right?"

His solicitude was disconcerting. Harry wasn't used to associating Malfoy with care or kindness. "Yeah, go on," he said. "I'm happy just to float."

And float he did, stretched out on his back, limbs loose, watching the clouds, feeling cool and light and cradled. Malfoy swam out, out, out, then back; out, out, out, then back. It was rare for Harry to watch this kind of physical prowess without feeling jealous, but for some reason, when he watched Malfoy he only felt content. Why had he not been swimming this whole time? What had he been thinking, sitting beside the lake but never getting into it? Soon it would be too cold. Harry had wasted so much time. 

The sun was lower on the horizon, the light turning from bright white to gold, and the next time Malfoy swam his return lap, he said, "I'm going to get out. Are you --?"

"I'll get out too," Harry said, letting his legs drift beneath him. If he was careful, it didn't hurt too much to kick, and he used his good arm to steer himself until his feet touched sand. Malfoy was looking at him, and Harry was beginning to recognize the different variations on his unsmiling smiles. This one was amused. "What?" Harry said self-consciously. 

"You're still wearing your glasses."

"Oh. Yeah, I like seeing, thanks." He was waist deep and gravity was beginning to reassert its hold on him, his arm hanging heavily from his damaged shoulder, his leg protesting the weight of his body. It was an unwelcome sensation, this return to the realities of life on land. He tightened his jaw, trying to keep his balance on the lake floor as he got heavier and heavier, and out of nowhere, he found himself yawning hugely.

Oh no. 

"Malfoy," he warned, and then he fell asleep.

Sixty seconds later he woke up, lying on the sand with his legs still in the water and a gentle current lapping at his ankles. Malfoy's face was above him, his blue eyes wide, his mouth twisted like he was laughing, or frowning, or trying to decide between the two. 

"Shit," Harry said. 

"It's four ten," Malfoy said. "Well -- four eleven, now."

"Yeah." Harry propped himself up on his good elbow. "I gathered." He sat up all the way. 

"You are very lucky," Malfoy said, speaking slowly, "that we were already on our way out. That I was nearby. If I'd still been swimming, you could've -- it could've been very bad."

"Well... it wasn't." 

"You need to keep better track of the time. What if this happens while you're -- while you're driving?"

"A _car?_ Malfoy, have you been spending time with Muggles?"

"That isn't the point," Malfoy said furiously. "The point is, you need to take better care of yourself."

Harry closed his eyes. He expected this from Hermione, sure. From Ron, a bit. From Molly Weasley. But from Draco bloody Malfoy? "Well, maybe you should brew better potions."

"Yes, I should."

Harry opened his eyes again. He couldn't fight with someone who wasn't fighting back. "I'm sorry, all right? I lost track of the time. I won't do it again."

Malfoy sat back on his heels, nostrils flaring, and Harry's mouth dropped open. 

"Malfoy, were you _worried_ about me?"

"I didn't know what had happened!" Malfoy said. "I thought you'd passed out, or been hit with a curse, or had a bloody cardiac arrest, you just said my name and boom, you went down like a sack of bricks. I grabbed you and starting yelling my head off for help, and then --" Suddenly, unimaginably, Malfoy was giggling. "And then you started -- oh, Merlin -- you started _snoring_."

Harry could not help himself. He started laughing, too. 

"I remembered pretty quickly after that," Malfoy said, still giggling, "and then -- then you woke up."

"I'm sorry," Harry laughed, "No, really I am. My students lost their heads the first time, too." He rubbed sand from the back of his neck, grinning, and planted his good hand on the ground, readying himself to try and stand. Malfoy was already climbing to his feet, and to Harry's surprise, he offered his hand. Harry hesitated, then took it. Malfoy hauled him up, then steadied him with a palm on his chest, and Harry was suddenly forcibly reminded that neither of them were wearing many clothes. He flushed and stepped away, busying himself with gathering his wand and trousers.

"Here," Harry said, and flicked his wand to dry Malfoy from head to toe, adding in a little warming charm at the end. Instead of thanking him, Malfoy stared as if he'd just turned a backflip.

"Potter," he said slowly. "Do you make a habit of nonverbal spellwork?"

"Oh," Harry said. Had he not spoken aloud just now? "Yeah, sometimes. When I'm not really thinking about it."

"Sometimes," Malfoy repeated. "When you're not really thinking about it."

"It's harder if I'm concentrating," Harry explained. 

Malfoy shook his head. "You can see why it's hard not to resent you, right?"

"Well," Harry said generously, "you have much better hair."

Getting dressed was always a bit trickier than getting undressed, but he managed it pretty smoothly, he thought. Malfoy didn't seem to notice how little he used his left arm and he didn't try to hide the buttoning charm, or the charm to tie his shoes; better Malfoy think he was lazy rather than secretive, because secretive implied secrets and secrets invited questions. He packed up his notebook and quills and the stack of essays he hadn't even touched and slung his bag over his good shoulder as Malfoy waited. 

"If you're in a hurry for any reason, you should go on ahead," Harry said. "I'm not exactly fast."

Malfoy shrugged this off with the barest lift of his shoulder and matched his pace to Harry's as they started back up to the castle. It was lovely walk, through a small wood and then up the sloping green meadow, and the early evening sun was taking on a pinkish glow. For a while they walked in silence, each lost in their own thoughts, and then Malfoy said, "Look up."

"Look -- what?" Harry followed his pointing finger. There, above the Quidditch pitch, players were swooping like enormous birds, and one of the fliers was angling upwards, flying straight and fast and true.

"Someone's spotted the Snitch," Malfoy said. 

Harry felt a great rush of rage and envy and sadness pouring up from his chest and belly and lodging in his throat like a stone. He looked away from the faraway Seeker -- it was too much like looking into the sun, beautiful and blinding. The walk was taking its toll on him and he was getting tired, the worst of his pain kept at bay by Malfoy's potion but only just, and he could feel his limp growing heavier with each step, as if the sight of the Seeker had robbed him of precious stamina.

"It's true what they were saying about brooms at dinner," Malfoy said. "About Nimbus's new comfort line. I think if you wanted to fly again you might try --"

"I've looked into it," Harry said, which was true, though not recently. "I can't."

"Is it your arm you're worried about? I had a friend in France who lost her arm to a dragon and --" Malfoy stopped walking because Harry had stopped. Harry had stopped walking because all the blood had rushed from his head and was worried he might fall over. "Oh," Malfoy said, taking in his pale, furious face. "Right. Sorry. I forgot we're supposed to pretend like we don't know."

Harry tried to speak but couldn't. He felt wretched and frightened and above all, exposed. _We're_ supposed to pretend? _We_ don't know? Bad enough that his secret was apparently out; was it a topic of discussion, too? Were people laughing behind his back, gossiping about all the ways he was weakened and useless? Quietly, he said, "What do you mean?"

Malfoy sighed. "Can we play another game of pretend and pretend I didn't say anything?"

"What the fuck do you think you know about my arm, Malfoy?" Anger was so much more comfortable than shame. 

"I wouldn't claim to know anything -- except that it's clearly been injured, and you clearly don't want anyone noticing."

Harry had a vision of himself, suddenly, as Kreacher -- Kreacher as he'd once been, sneaking around in plain sight as if no one could see him, muttering obscenities and insults as if no one could hear him. He, Harry, was no better than a mad old house elf, thinking he was being so subtle, so secretive, when really he was broadcasting loud and clear to anyone around him, _Who's looking for an easy target? Over here! Pick me!_

"How many people know?"

"How on earth would I know? Anyone who's been watching you, I expect." Malfoy's voice got a bit softer, which was worse. "I didn't mean to imply I've talked of it with anyone, I haven't. It's entirely possible I'm the only one who's noticed. McGonagall certainly hasn't, she keeps trying to pass you the heaviest things on the dinner table."

Harry was breathing hard. "Don't placate me."

"Potter, I'm sorry, but why bother concealing it? It seems a waste of energy."

"If word gets out," Harry said, practically panting now, both with anger and because they were going up a rather steep hill, "If word gets out that it's not just my leg, it's my arm, too, it's half my sodding body, it'll just make it that much easier for anyone to take me down. They'll know all my weaknesses, they'll be able to plan, they'll come after me, and the next time that happens, it's over, I'm done for. I can't fight anymore, not like this."

Malfoy didn't say anything, and Harry tried to catch his breath, tried to calm down. They were nearly to the castle now and he was limping so badly he knocked into Malfoy every time he pulled weight off his bad leg. 

"Budge over," he roared. "Why are you walking so bloody close?"

Malfoy moved several feet away. "I'm sorry," he said finally. "I understand why you're scared."

"I'm not scared, I'm cautious!"

"I won't say anything about your arm," Malfoy said. "If it makes you feel better."

"It's not about me feeling better!"

"Oh, you're impossible. You think not being able to open a potion bottle really matters to --"

Harry whirled on him, hot with fury. "Malfoy, the newspapers reported every detail of what happened to me since the second those wizards took me from the Ministry last year. Everyone knows what they did to me and what I did to them. My bloody students know that I was stripped naked and tortured for three days and then went mental and turned into a magical bomb. Can you imagine teaching great roomfuls of teenagers who've all seen photos of you strapped to a stretcher with no clothes on and someone else's brains splattered on your face? Really try and picture it."

"I -- yes, no, that sounds horrible."

"Can you blame me for wanting to keep one thing private? One tiny fucking tragic detail? Everybody knows I can't walk, they know I'm bleeding useless, is it really so unreasonable that I don't want it known I can't open sodding potions bottles?"

They were on the flagstones before the castle entrance, now, and a thick group of laughing, chatting students was coming towards them. Harry was suddenly aware that he was very red-faced, and standing very close to Malfoy, and swaying a bit on his feet. He took a step back, nodding and smiling at the students who streamed past them: nothing to see here, I wasn't yelling at your Potions master, we were just in a bit of friendly academic banter, lovely day!

Malfoy waited til the students had passed and then he said, "No."

Harry had forgotten what he'd said. His leg was aching, his shoulder hurt, he was hungry. "No, what?"

"No, it isn't unreasonable. But also, no, you're not useless."

Harry shook his head, sighing. "Look, I didn't mean to shout at you. I -- I can get a bit worked up."

Malfoy raised an eyebrow. "Some things never change." Then he said, "I also apologize. What you want known is your business. I didn't realize it was a sore subject or I wouldn't have been so cavalier."

"Right now, everything's sore," Harry said. He'd suddenly lost all energy for argument. There was a stone bench a few paces away and he glanced at it and said, "I need to sit down for a bit. I guess I'll see you at dinner."

For a moment he thought Malfoy might protest, might try and wait with him, but to his relief, the other man just nodded. 

"Thanks for the swim," Harry said. 

Malfoy gave him a rigid, courtly little bow that might've been mocking or might've just been part of Malfoy's wealthy, inbred, horrid upbringing, or maybe it was just Malfoy, oddly formal, oddly gracious, totally infuriating. He sank down onto the bench and watched Malfoy walk away, and noticed too late he wasn't the only one watching: there was a gaggle of sixth-year girls staring and giggling and whispering behind their hands. Probably incoherent from the sight of their handsome Potions professor in swim trunks. They were looking at Harry, too, and he gave them a tired little wave that set them all giggling again. 

At least one thing hadn't changed from his time at Hogwarts, he thought, stretching his leg out and digging his hand into the tight muscles around his hip. Hormones.


	5. Chapter 5

"Professor Potter?" 

Class had just ended, and Silvia Grupnik, Slytherin sixth-year, stood before him clutching her textbook. Behind her, two other girls waited. 

"Yes?" Harry said, and she skittered back. He might have spoken too sharply -- he was trying in vain to get his bad hand to grip tightly enough to help him open a bottle of ink, and was forced to think balefully of Malfoy's comment about potion bottles. 

"I have a quick question?"

"If you open this for me, I'll answer anything you like," he said.

She looked confused but willing. "We were wondering," she said, neatly unscrewing the lid and putting the bottle on his desk, "where your Floo goes?"

The girls behind her started giggling. 

"Where it -- goes?" Did they teach these children nothing? "It goes anywhere there's another Floo. You see, you enter when the flames are green and --"

"Yes, I know how it works. But do you have a Floo in your bedroom?"

What a question! Was it inappropriate to tell the truth? "Yes? Though it's not, of course, erm, public."

"Do all the professors?"

Harry ran a hand through his hair, utterly flummoxed. "I don't know. I don't expect so. I use it because I've trouble with the stairs."

"Oh," Silvia said. She sounded oddly put-out. "Well. That does make sense."

"If you --" She seemed mobile enough, but you never could tell "-- If you're having your own trouble getting to class, we could talk to Headmistress McGonagall and --"

"No!" shrieked Silvia, and all three girls fell about with laughter. "No, that's not it, but thank you!"

"You're... welcome?"

They scampered out, still laughing incomprehensibly. Harry shook his head and glanced at his desk. At least his ink was open. 

:::

"Has anyone else had any odd questions about the Floo system?" Harry asked his colleagues at dinner a few nights later. A third year boy called Jacob had hung back after class that morning and asked how many Floos there were in the castle, total.

"Total?" Harry had said. Jacob had nodded eagerly. "I don't know, actually. There's a public one on every floor, and then one in the Great Hall, and this one here in my classroom..."

"So that's... nine, that you know of."

"Yes."

"But haven't you one in --" Jacob giggled "--your bedroom."

Now Harry was starting to get annoyed and a bit nervous. "Yes, so, ten I suppose."

"But there are others?"

"Yes. If you're looking for exact numbers, for a -- a project, or something, the Headmistress may be able to tell you."

Now, both McGonagall and Malfoy said, "Yes." They glanced at one another, and Malfoy beckoned for McGonagall to go first. 

"I had a group of students wanting to know how many Floos there are in the castle, total," she said. "It's a matter of public record, so I told them: Eleven."

"That's what they asked me," Harry said. "Malfoy?"

Malfoy looked distinctly uncomfortable. "No. They asked me if -- if I had a Floo in my -- chambers."

"Oh, for heaven's sake," said McGonagall. "I hope you told them to put their noses right out of it."

"Naturally," said Malfoy. 

Harry focused on spearing a forkful of peas, embarrassed to've answered outright. Well, no one had ever told him how to answer student queries about his bedchamber. 

"The next day, the same group showed up in my office," Malfoy continued. "To investigate my fireplace and see if was Floo connected. They were -- unnervingly excited to discover that it is."

"Did someone assign a project?" Harry wondered, but the professors all looked around at one another, shrugging.

"Here, Potter, pass this to Professor Soobs," McGonagall said, and attempted to hand him an enormous platter of roast beef. Before he could figure out a way to casually take out his wand and float it down the table, Malfoy, who was sitting across from them, stood abruptly and leaned to take it out of McGonagall's surprised hands. 

"I haven't had any yet," he said -- which was a lie, there was a slice half-eaten on his plate. Had he been trying to save Harry the awkwardness of magicking what anyone else would simply have taken? Was this his way of trying to make up the argument they'd had the other day about his arm? And since when did Malfoy try and make it up to anyone, for anything? 

"Potter," Malfoy said. "Your sleeve's in the gravy."

Git.

:::

Ron and Hermione, it turned out, had been only half-right. The semester was flying by, but Harry did, in fact, have time to miss them, and he went into disproportionate agonies when they sent him an owl with a photograph of Rosie displaying a brand-new bottom tooth. He made the trek all the way to the Herbology greenhouse to find Neville and show him.

"Very good tooth!" Neville said, after he'd come out from where he'd been pruning an enormous bush of purple, howling flowers. He held the photo gingerly between two soil-covered fingers, then handed it back. 

"No, look," Harry insisted. "There, on her gum, I think she's about to start growing _another_ one soon!"

"Right, well, kids do, you know."

Harry let him hand the photo back and looked at it morosely. "Isn't she the loveliest child?"

"She -- certainly looks like Ron," Neville said. "Cheer up, Harry, the Hogsmeade weekend's right around the corner, and didn't you say you're staying the night? You'll have all of Sunday with them -- and with Rosie's new teeth."

This did cheer Harry up, and he tucked the photo back into his pocket. "D'you want to come round for a drink later? I've got absolutely nothing to grade for the first time all term."

"I can't," Neville said, looking sorry. "The Herbology club's got their pet cactus show tonight, I promised to judge. Next time."

Disappointed, Harry made his way back through the damp, lush air of the greenhouse and out into the darkening evening. A fall chill had entered the wind, and everything smelled of fallen leaves and cooling earth. He wasn't ready yet to go back to his stuffy room, so he took a detour past Hagrid's old cottage, feeling such a swell of nostalgia that he nearly broke into song. He needed to remember to owl Hagrid, soon -- it had been a while since they'd last exchanged letters. The sky was charcoal grey with a limn of pink light by the time he was trudging back into the castle, and his potion was beginning to wear off. Still, he felt reluctant to return upstairs. 

He was _bored._

In London he'd be out drinking right now with the other Aurors, recounting the day's adventures, comparing notes, maybe flirting a bit with whoever seemed interested. If he was in the right mood, he might even pick up a Muggle who'd never heard the name "Harry Potter" and have a nice, casual shag with someone who had no idea who he was, what he’d done, what he’d been through. 

If Harry had stayed in London, if he'd taken the godforsaken paper-pushing desk job the Ministry had offered, would he still be invited drinking with his old colleagues? Or would they get close-mouthed when he came near, retreating into that aura of Auror secrecy he'd been so glad to be a part of? Maybe he should have just taken the damn job instead of locking himself up in the middle-of-nowhere Scotland where his one friend would rather look at cactuses than drink with him. 

He went into his empty classroom to use the Floo, but instead of stating "Harry Potter's Bedroom," he found himself requesting the fifth floor, and then, walking down the hallway, and then, somehow, standing in front of Draco Malfoy's office. 

Before he could think better, he knocked. 

The door flew open. Malfoy was behind his desk, as he always was, looking like someone had posed him for a portrait: Still Life of Young Professor with Lilies. 

"Potter?"

"What's with the lilies?"

Malfoy looked at the vase on his desk. "They're... pretty?"

"Gift from an admirer?"

Malfoy seemed to consider the question. "Yes," he said.

Why did Harry's stomach clench at that answer?

"If," Malfoy said, "you consider my mother an admirer." 

Harry felt himself grinning. "Oh, absolutely. I seem to remember her admiring you very much. It was my own mother's name, you know -- Lily." What had possessed him to add this?

"I know," Malfoy said. He looked at the flowers again and touched one of their petals with a slim finger, then dropped his hand. "What brings you to my office?"

"Well," Harry said. He moved to take a seat and then, remembering how uncomfortable the seat in question was, decided to lean on the back of it instead. "You seem like a man with a lot of nice things."

Malfoy raised his chin. "Bizarre as always, Potter, but I suppose you’re not wrong. And?"

"I feel like you probably have some nice liquor hidden around here somewhere."

Malfoy stared at him, and then burst out laughing. It was so rare to see him laugh that Harry could never help laughing along with him when it happened. "Considering you've broken into this very office,” Malfoy said, “I assume you know that's true. Dark or light?"

"Dark," Harry said. "We are talking booze, not magic, right?"

"Ha, ha. Let's see -- I have an American bourbon aged in unicorn horns; a Muggle scotch from Japan; and a local catnip whiskey, which is much nicer than it sounds."

"Catnip? Sounds interesting."

Malfoy went to his wooden cabinet and took down a bottle and two glasses. "Have a seat."

"Erm -- your chair's actually a bit -- I'd rather stand."

Malfoy furrowed his brow. "It's not comfortable?"

"Have you never sat in it?"

Distracted from pouring drinks, Malfoy crossed the room and deposited himself in the chair. He shifted a bit. Extended his legs. Put his arms on the armrest. "Why has no one ever told me?" he demanded. "This chair cost 200 Galleons!"

"It does _look_ very good."

"Well, go on and sit in my desk chair, I reckon I can handle a bit of discomfort better than you."

Harry thought he should be insulted by this, but it was only the truth. He went round behind Malfoy's desk and sat down, enjoying both the sweet smell of lilies and the odd experience of being behind someone else's desk. He clanked around in his pockets for a potion and drank it as Malfoy came over with two glasses.

"That's still working for you?" Malfoy said, nodding at the empty vial. 

"Yeah, it's grand." He took a sip of whiskey. "Merlin, so is this."

"You're lucky," Malfoy said. "Usually on a Wednesday at this time I'd be knee deep in parchment, but I've just finished grading the last one."

"You know," Harry confessed, "it honestly never occurred to me that our professors didn't _like_ grading. I thought it was like -- their after-class hobby. They always seemed to so relish handing back the low marks."

"I hate giving out anything below passing," Malfoy said, frowning. "I've had quite enough of playing the villain for one lifetime."

"I hate it too," Harry said. "Maybe because I've always enjoyed playing the hero."

There it was, twice in one night! Malfoy's genuine laughter. 

"At least you're self-aware." Malfoy sipped his whiskey and then turned the glass around in his hand. "I heard you talking to Neville the other night about Hogsmeade. That's where Weasley and Granger ended up, didn't they? Or -- I suppose I ought to say, the Minister and the Mr. Minister."

"Yes, they've a lovely house. I've spent a lot of time there." Unable to help himself, he fished Rosie's picture out of his pocket and handed it over, beaming. 

"Another Weasley," Malfoy said in tones of faint horror.

"Look at her teeth," Harry insisted. "And her freckles. And her long nose. Isn't she perfect?"

Malfoy was nearly smiling when he handed back the picture. "Granger's genes seem to be fighting a losing battle."

"Yeah, the only battle she'll ever lose."

Malfoy outright grinned at this. "Youngest Minister in wizarding history. Quite a title to live up to."

"She's already living up to it," Harry said, voice a bit sharp. 

"Relax, Potter, I didn't mean to disparage her. I've been following her career, for obvious reasons, and I've been quite impressed with some of the legislation she's written. You must be proud."

"I am," Harry said fiercely. So proud he couldn't say anything more on the subject without getting choked up. "And your old school friends? Have you kept in touch with any of them?" The wankers, he added silently. 

"Very few," said Malfoy. "Many of us went in... different directions. I'm closest with Blaise Zabini, if you remember him?"

"Yes," Harry said with some distaste.

"He was terrible, like all of us," Malfoy said, as if in agreement. "But he's one of the only other ones who made it out."

"Out?"

Malfoy shrugged, overly casual in a way that made Harry think he wasn't feeling very casual at all. "That's what it feels like. To have left that world. I know how it looks from the outside, but it's -- it's not easy to realize that everything you were taught, everything you were raised to think, was a hateful lie. It cost me pretty much everyone in my life, except mum. And Blaise. We lived together in France for a while."

Harry had to ask. "Lived together like... _lived_ together?"

"As roommates," Malfoy clarified. "Blaise isn't interested in men."

He did not say anything about himself, and Harry realized his heart had given a little jump. 

Oh Merlin, he thought. No. Please let this not be happening. Please don't let me have a crush on Draco. Fucking. Malfoy. 

"We used to go to these Muggle counseling sessions together," Malfoy said. He had a thin gold ring on his thumb that he was clanking nervously against his glass. "For people who'd grown up in -- in what the Muggles call hate groups. A lot of the people there were from very extreme religious organizations and the like, and Blaise and I mostly just listened. But it was good to be around people who... understood how deep such an upbringing goes. People who didn't spit on me when they saw the Dark Mark. Not," Malfoy said hastily, "that I'm asking for sympathy about that. Spit is far better than what most Death Eaters did to people they disagreed with."

"Case in point," Harry said, gesturing to his body. 

Malfoy winced. "Yes."

"The Ministry made me go to counseling," Harry said. Malfoy was tilting the bottle at him and he pushed his glass forward, nodding. "A few times when I was an Auror. I used to -- I'd get very angry, sometimes, and it wasn't productive. They made me go for that. And then, once or twice after I'd been injured. Not this injury; others, smaller ones. I got accused of, er, self-destructive recklessness."

"Sounds – not inaccurate."

"Yeah. Well." Harry took a drink. "I was in some counseling groups with other people who'd – who'd fought, in the war – and everyone was very keen to push this narrative about how sometimes it's hard to know when to _stop_ fighting... But everyone was awkward in those sessions and I never got much out of them. No one spoke to me or -- even really looked me in the eye. I know what you're thinking, here's Harry Potter blubbering on about his tragic celebrity again, but it's really only my old school friends who know how to actually... see me."

"What about your old school enemies?" Malfoy said. 

Harry glanced up, smiling and surprised. "Well, I dunno about, for instance Pansy Parkinson, whose son seems to have inherited a certain prejudice against me, but in your case -- I think so, yeah."

Malfoy poured them both another knuckle of whiskey and leaned over the desk to clink his glass with Harry's.

"What are we toasting?" Harry asked. "To old times?"

"Merlin, no, the old times were horrible."

"To new times?" Harry suggested. 

Malfoy rolled his eyes. "Sappy, but I'll accept."

Their glasses chimed like a bell as they connected.

:::

The next day, Harry was accosted by a group of Gryffindor third years in the Great Hall. It wasn't an ideal time to be accosted -- he was already late to lunch and he'd missed breakfast due to hangover, and was now both wildly hungry and a bit nauseous, a terrible combination he hoped to remedy with something greasy, like a grilled cheese. He could practically taste the buttered bread and the mild tang of cheese, but now all these students were standing in his way, demanding to know if it was true that he and Professor Malfoy had both been Seekers when they were at school. 

"Yes," he said, looking longingly to the staff table, where he could see his colleagues already finishing up their lunch. "Why?"

"Did you ever train together?" one boy asked, Jacob: the same who'd come to his office to ask about the Floo. 

"Train toge -- of course not, we were on rival teams!"

"Rivals," a girl sighed. 

Hanna was at the back of the group, her arms folded and eyes rolling like she was above whatever nonsense was being performed, and he looked to her pleadingly. She gave him a small shrug: you're on your own. 

"Here comes Professor Malfoy now," Harry said, "maybe you can talk to him, instead."

Malfoy was indeed making his way towards them, looking as put-together as always but with a bit of a tired blue shadow under his eyes, and Harry found himself grinning. They'd made a rather sizeable dent in the bottle of that catnip whiskey and had ended up in the library at 3am trying to find a book to settle a bet about the origins of the "accio" charm. Harry knew they'd figured it out eventually but he couldn't remember who'd won. 

His appearance made quite an impression on the students, who all began giggling for no reason Harry could discern. 

"Hi Professor Malfoy!" Jacob piped up. 

"Hello, Jacob," Malfoy said.

"Hi Professor Malfoy!" squeaked another girl. 

"Hello, Franny."

"Hi Professor Malfoy," Harry said, still grinning. 

Malfoy sniffed regally. "Professor Potter. You left this in my office last night."

"Oh!" Harry said, taking back the photo of Rosie. "I was wondering where this had gone!"

Absolute silence had fallen over the students, and Harry immediately took the exit offered, giving them a wave and moving to follow Malfoy towards the faculty table. Another wave of giggling broke out in their wake and he heard Jacob sigh, "Absolutely fucking _epic_."

"How're you feeling today, Professory Malfoy?" Harry asked.

"Not at my absolute best, for some reason. Bloody starving, though. Slept through breakfast."

"I did, too," Harry said. They'd reached the stairs to the platform with the faculty tables and Malfoy paused to wait as Harry took them slowly. Aside from the hangover, he'd really been feeling all right that morning, and so it was a shock when, out of nowhere, his knee buckled out from under him. He reached frantically for something, anything, but there was no railing to grip and nothing to hold onto and it was happening, the thing he'd been dreading since day one, he was going to hit the ground in front of all his students and they'd never be able to look at him again without seeing him flat on the ground, and –

The fall, it hadn't come. 

"Steady," Malfoy said, right in his ear. He had an arm around Harry's waist and a shoulder under his good arm, keeping him upright. Malfoy had caught him. 

"Fuck," Harry said. "Fucking fuck."

"You're all right, come on, let's just get you up this last step. I can take more weight that that, Potter, go on. Good. Can you stand on your own? Do you need my arm?"

"My knee," Harry said, clutching Malfoy's arm like a debutante at a ball, "it's bollocksed."

"Harry," Neville said, coming over from the faculty table. "Are you all right?"

"Bring us that chair there, would you Neville?"

Even through his embarrassment, Harry felt a strange pang when he heard Malfoy call Neville by his first name. Neville rushed over with the chair and Malfoy lowered Harry down into it. To Harry's horror, a crowd of students was gathering at the foot of the shallow steps, drawn like sharks to blood by the smell of drama, and one of them called, "Is Professor Potter all right?"

"He'll be fine if you lot stop gawking at him," Malfoy said, and flung a pointer finger towards the door. "Go. I'm not joking, go on."

Meekly, they went, and Harry felt supremely grateful. Neville was crouched by his side, saying, in panicky tones, "Harry, what's happened?" 

Harry gave him a pat on the shoulder. "I'm okay, Neville, only my bloody knee gave out. It doesn't even hurt that badly, just decided to skive off work with no warning. Hi, Professor McGonagall, I'm fine, please no one make a fuss."

"I'll get Poppy," McGonagall said anxiously.

"No, really, that isn't necessary," Harry said. "I just need to sit for a bit and I'll be right as rain, please, please, would you all just go back to your lunches?"

"He's perfectly all right, as you can see, Minerva," said Malfoy, in a slow, soothing voice Harry'd only heard from him once, on the other fucking set of fucking stairs he'd fallen down. "I'll give him a once-over to be on the safe side. Most helpful thing you both can do is give him space."

"Thank you," Harry said when Neville and McGonagall had reluctantly gone back to the table. 

Malfoy shrugged off the thanks. "You're not in any pain? Any more than usual, I mean?"

"No, it's only -- it does this sometimes, but not for a while -- it just goes all liquidy and useless. Ah, fuck. It'll be fine, I'll just do a Locking charm. Why don't any fucking stairs around here have a fucking railing?" He realized his voice had gotten far too loud, and he took off his glasses to massage the bridge of his nose. 

"Here, put out your leg, I'll do it. Bend it just a bit, it'll feel better when you take the charm off later. Yes, like that."

Harry let Malfoy manipulate his leg to his liking then gently cast the charm. It was better than Harry's own, he realized -- there was something warm and cushiony about it, where Harry's Locking charm felt like he'd strapped his knee to a piece of wood. 

"How'd you do that?" Harry said. "It feels loads better than when I do."

"I'll show you later," Malfoy said. “It’s in the wrist, I learned when I was in France.”

"Why'd you leave off Healing?" Harry said. "You seem to be quite good at it, actually."

"That's a long story," said Malfoy. "But to make it short, I was offered this position, and I accepted. Here." He put out his hand and Harry gripped it, staggering upright. "Will you be okay to get around?"

"I hope so. I've done this before but -- not in a place as big as this. Just at home, at Ron and Hermione's and the like. We both know what happened last time I tried it here." He took a few awkward, halting steps to the table, and shrugged. "It'll do. Thanks very much. Budge over Neville, would you? And please don't ask me if I'm all right. I promise, you'll know when I'm not. Pass the sausages."

"Erm," Neville said. He clearly did not know what to say if he wasn’t allowed to fuss. "How -- is everything? Otherwise?"

"Bloody brilliant," Harry said, stabbing a sausage with his knife. The hangover combined with the near-fall combined with his stiff knee and the exhausting prospect of a day spent hobbling around even worse than he already hobbled around had turned his mood very sour indeed. "You?"

"Good, yeah," Neville gulped, and turned back to his food. Harry would feel guilty later but for now he just felt tired. Tired of everything but especially of himself. 

He ate his lunch mechanically, without making conversation, and though he did feel a bit better after he'd gotten some food down, he was counting the hours until his last class when he could take dinner in his chambers and not talk to anyone until the next morning. He did manage a, "Sorry, Neville, bit of a grump today," as Neville stood to leave, and was rewarded with a smile and a pat on the arm. Neville was blessedly difficult to offend. 

He hauled himself up and stumped gracelessly to the stairs, where he had the horrible realization that there was absolutely no way of getting down them without some form of support -- preferably a _fucking railing_. He was so fucking angry he felt like throwing himself off the platform just to hear people scream.

"Potter?" McGonagall said from behind him, and he turned on her, the closest target.

"I eat here every day, just like you," he said. "And every fucking day I have to deal with this, every fucking day I come here and pray I'll get up these fucking stairs, and it never gets any easier. We're bloody wizards, we can turn tables into bloody teapots but we can't manage a simple fucking railing?”

McGonagall had taken a step back, one hand going to her chest, and Harry realized he'd been yelling.

"If you'd asked --" she started. 

"I don't want to ask," he hissed. "I just want some consideration."

"The Floo --"

"I had to fall down a flight of stairs for that to be a priority," Harry said, but the fight was draining out of him and in its wake was his old friend: shining, shimmering shame. "Fuck," he said. He put a hand to the wall, trying to keep his balance. "Don't listen to me, I'm -- I'm just tired, and -- an arsehole, and I shouldn't have spoken to you like that, I really shouldn't have. Go on and sack me, I deserve it."

"No," McGonagall said with dignity. "I mean, yes, I'd prefer a more civilized discourse in general, but -- I'm not going to sack you."

"I'd sack me."

"No," she said, "but you probably would've noticed sooner that one of your staff was struggling, and put up a railing. You're right, it isn't difficult and we should have done it sooner. It'll be in by tomorrow."

This no-nonsense agreement made Harry feel even worse. "Professor --"

"If you can shout at me like that, you can call be by my name, I think," she said.

"Mi -- Minerva. I'm so sorry."

She held up a hand. "You are forgiven. But in the future I'd kindly ask you to bring up any issues you may have _before_ you feel the need to explode.”

"The famous Potter temper graces the Great Hall once more," drawled Malfoy. He put a hand on Harry's shoulder. "Class is starting. Come on, down we go."

Harry, because he did not know what else to do, took the support that Malfoy was offering and made his clunky way down the steps. 

"I'm all right from here," Harry said. "No more stairs between me and my classroom. Good thing or I'd probably shout at the students, too. Merlin, why am I such a tosser?"

"Well, you'll get your railing, at any rate," Malfoy said. "Are you free before dinner tonight, by the way? I have an idea I'd like to run by you."

"I'm not," Harry said, feeling absolutely crestfallen for reasons he didn’t want to examine too closely. "I'm in student meetings about the next exam."

"Tomorrow, then -- come during my office hours."

"Yeah, that should work."

Malfoy left him at the Floo and a moment later, Harry was wobbling into his classroom. It was populated by many of the same people who'd been asking him daft questions before lunch that morning, and when Jacob's hand shot up he said, "Don't, I'm in no mood."

"I -- I only wanted to ask if -- if pixies were going to be on the test?"

"Oh. Yes. Sorry." He sat gingerly on his desk, stiff leg propped to one side. "As you can see, my knee's not working properly today, so I've frozen it in place with a Locking charm. This is a variation on which curse, do you think?"

Hanna's hand flew up. "Locomotor Mortis, the Leg-Locker Curse!"

"Exactly, good. And does anyone know the difference between the Leg-Locker Curse and the one I've got going now?"

Again, Hanna. "Leg-Locker binds your legs together, doesn't it? This just keeps the one leg straight."

"Excellent, ten points each to Gryffindor and Slytherin. Today, in honor of my own horrible mood, I'm going to teach you three spells, all related: the Limb-Locker, which is what I've got going, the Leg-Locker, and the Jelly-knees. They're all technically curses, but as you can see, even curses have their use outside of fighting. Can I get a few volunteers to help put down mats? I have a feeling you'll be falling a lot."

They did fall a lot, but they also laughed themselves silly, and it cheered Harry up greatly. He didn't even mind when Jacob asked, "Professor, Abigail said she saw Professor Malfoy locking your knee for you, is that true or is she telling tales?"

"It – it is true," Harry said, flushing to think one of his students had seen it, and Jacob let out a tiny high-pitched scream, like a teakettle, and fell sideways out of his desk. Harry, who'd been leaning against a wall, pitched forward in such alarm that he almost fell, whipping out his wand. "What's happened? Jacob?"

"Ignore him, Professor," Hanna said, poking Jacob's prone body with a toe. "He's just very excitable."

As the students were leaving, Harry said, "Hanna, a word?" and when she came to his desk he said, "You seem sensible. Will you explain to me what is going on? The giggling, the screaming, the questions about the Floo... Am I out of my mind to feel they're related?"

Hanna gave him a speculative look and crossed her arms. "I'll tell you, Professor," she said. "But if you don't like it, you can't be angry with me. And you can't tell anyone I've told, they already call me a teacher's pet and they'll be furious."

Harry felt conflicted about asking a student to choose between her professor and her social group, but curiosity, as it always did with him, won out. "You have my word. Go on."

"They've got this _theory_ ," she said, tossing her head as if her hair were more than an inch long, which it wasn't. "About... well, it started with the Floo network, don't ask me _why_... But some of them figured out that only you and Professor Malfoy have private Floos -- all the rest are public."

"All right," Harry said slowly. 

"And they're absolutely convinced it's because you two are having a secret love affair."

Harry could not have been more surprised if she'd suddenly turned into a Hippogriff and flown away. "You've got to be joking." Oh, but it was all making sense, their stupid questions, the way they'd gone batty when he and Malfoy had spoken in the Great Hall... "Hanna," he said. "Er -- do me a favor, and tell them we're not?"

"They won't believe me, Professor," she said confidently. "They won't _want_ to believe me, they're having a wonderful time."

"Well, maybe just spread the rumor? That we're not -- doing that? We're not involved?"

She gave him the sympathetic smile of a much older person and patted his shoulder. "Don't worry, Professor."

He could tell that what she really meant was: Tough shit.


	6. Chapter 6

Harry debated telling Malfoy about what Hanna had admitted. He even practiced how he'd say it, lightly, with great good humour, a silly joke, kids these days! But somehow he couldn't manage it and he decided that there was no need, it would only be awkward. Still, when Draco let him into his office for their meeting the next afternoon, he couldn't help but blush at the sight of him. 

"All right, Potter? Do you like your new hard-won railing?"

Harry half-smiled. "Love it. Though to be honest, I'd trade it for not having shouted at McGonagall."

"You've shouted at me loads of times and I survived just fine."

"And you? How are -- wait, is that a new chair?"

Malfoy smiled unsmilingly. "It is. Try it out, and be honest with me."

The last chair had been low, and wooden, with uncomfortable slats in uncomfortable places and armrests at exactly the worst height. This new chair was cushioned and comforting and supportive and solid. 

"Outstanding," Harry pronounced. "Where did you get it? I need one. No, I need two, in case one ever breaks."

"I ordered it from Betsy's Chairs 'n' Chairs in Hogsmeade, do you know it?"

"No, never been."

"Well," Malfoy said, “my idea might change that, if you think it’s a good one.” 

Harry raised an eyebrow. “All right…”

"First, I have to ask you a few questions that will no doubt make you angry," Malfoy said. "I'd rather not be shouted at, but if you must, you must."

Harry frowned. "I don't like this."

"Question one." Malfoy leaned across his desk. "Why don't you use anything to help you get around? A cane, a walking stick, even a crutch? I've seen you in multiple situations where a simple cane would've solved quite a few of your problems."

Malfoy was right. Harry got angry. "Oh, because if I had a cane, I wouldn't need a railing, is that it? You think I went mental over something I should've taken care of myself? It’s my fault I fell down the other day, is it?"

Malfoy waited patiently to see if there was more, then said, "Do you want to yell about other invented slights? Or will you answer the question?"

"I don't want to answer the bloody question."

"Will you answer this one, then? Does your lack of walking aid have anything to do with your lack of two working hands?"

Harry clenched his jaw. "Malfoy, where's this going? Just tell me so I can yell at you now and save us both time."

"I have a theory. I think you won't use anything because you're a paranoid bastard and you want to keep your wand-hand free. Just say yes or no, Potter."

Furious to have been so easily analyzed, Harry said, "No."

"Oh," said Malfoy. "Well, never mind. Meeting adjourned."

"Fine, yes. Yes, you're right. Merlin's tangled beard, you know I actually thought I was subtle before I met you?"

Malfoy had the temerity to laugh at this. 

"Do you have a point?" Harry said. "Or did you call me here to read my mind and then laugh at me for it?"

"It's not a point, it's just an idea. But you could commission someone to put your wand inside a cane."

Harry was high on simmering anger and it took a moment for him to come down enough to say, "What?"

"There are canes with swords in them, and daggers, and probably other things," said Malfoy. "If you found a decent craftsperson, like Betsy at Chairs 'n' Chairs, I imagine she could find a way to put your wand in a cane and rig it with a quick release, so you could have it at the ready whenever you needed it."

Harry started to formulate an irritated explanation of why this was an impenetrably stupid idea, but as he tried to come up with one, he realized that maybe it wasn't so stupid at all. Maybe it was actually quite good. 

Malfoy seemed encouraged by his silence and said, "If it interests you, you could make an appointment with Betsy in Hogsmeade this weekend. I just thought, since we'll be going anyway..."

Harry, speaking thickly around his own pride, said, "That would... make my life considerably easier."

Malfoy looked pleased, with maybe a shade of his old smugness. "You're welcome."

"What made you think of it?"

"My father had his wand in a walking stick for a time," Malfoy said. "Ornamental, but it was the same idea."

Harry was prejudiced against anything Lucius Malfoy had ever thought a good idea, but it seemed neither polite nor prudent to say this aloud. "Well. I appreciate you thinking about it. About me."

"If you do make an appointment, you can tell Betsy I sent you. She's a good friend."

Harry was suddenly more interested in Betsy. He'd never heard Malfoy refer to anyone as a good friend before, and he was interested to see what Malfoy's friends looked like these days. You could tell so much about a person from their friends -- and even more from they way they interacted with their friends.

"Or you could come with me," Harry said. "If you wanted to, I mean. If that's interesting to you. Or not."

"Oh," said Malfoy. "Yes, I mean, I -- yes, it's interesting. I'll owl Betsy and let her know. How's 2pm?"

"Perfect," said Harry. He was meeting Ron and Hermione at 4. "It's a date."

Immediately he thought of his students' ridiculous theory and wished he could take this back, but Malfoy didn't seem to register it as anything untoward. He only nodded, and picked up his quill, and Harry was dismissed.

:::

The day of the first Hogsmeade weekend was not exactly the bright, cheery morning that one might have hoped. It was grey and drizzling slightly and the grounds were slick with mud. This did absolutely nothing to dampen the students' excitement, especially the third years, for whom it was their first first visit -- and who were a particularly loud and excitable bunch anyway. 

Harry, who still felt horrid for yelling at McGonagall, or Minerva, or whatever he was supposed to call her, had reevaluated their conversation and tried to take her (few) words to heart. She was not wrong that he could have, and probably should have, asked for a railing to be installed instead of silently stewing in his own bitter juices. So he rallied his nerves and asked if there were, perhaps, maybe, an alternate form of transportation that could be arranged for anyone not feeling up to making the long walk into Hogsmeade.

He ended up in a thestral-pulled carriage with two students -- a third-year named Griggs who'd been hit with a vertigo charm and couldn't stay upright but refused to miss the first Hogsmeade weekend, and a seventh year named Keisha who had ambitions to being an Auror and had clearly only been pretending to feel poorly so she could have a chance to pepper Harry with questions outside of school hours. He'd have minded more if the canny maneuver hadn't put him somewhat in mind of himself as a teenager.

Harry's knee was acting up again -- it was the third time that week he'd been forced to Lock it, but he refused to let it worry him. It was only the change of season, he told himself. He wasn't backsliding. He'd be staying the night at Ron and Hermione's tiny cottage, which demanded absolutely none of the running-about he'd been doing for the past months, and after a weekend's rest his knee was sure to improve.

But he did feel a more determined interest in Malfoy's idea about the wand-cane. Walking with a Locked knee was difficult and cumbersome, and he had to be helped-down from the carriage by a thrilled Keisha. It was not how he'd have preferred to see Ron and Hermione for the first time in months -- he'd have liked to seem healthy and strong and capable of caring for himself in the way Hermione was always accusing him of not doing, but instead he looked as worn-out and run-ragged as he felt, and his stiff knee made him even slower and unsteadier than usual.

He was supposed to meet Malfoy at Betsy's at 2, but the cobblestones were rain-slick and uneven and by the time he turned the corner and caught sight of Malfoy, it was 2:15 and every muscle in his body was clenched from the tension of trying not to topple over. He tried not to imagine how much easier this would be with a cane; he didn't want to get his hopes up. 

Malfoy was waiting for him under the awning of the tea shop next door, looking unnervingly young and hip in a pair of extremely well-fitting jeans, a black waterproof bomber jacket, and a bright orange watchcap. Harry was so used to seeing him in sweeping, expensive robes that it was odd to see him looking not like a regal professor, but like the thirty year-old man who had at some point decided to get his nose pierced. Harry felt glad that he himself had worn a little piece of his life-outside-Hogwarts life, too -- black jeans and a green wool coat several people had told him brought out his eyes. The effect was somewhat ruined, he feared, by his jolting gait.

"Hi," Harry said, a bit out of breath. "Sorry I'm so late."

Malfoy looked him up and down. "Knee still out of order?"

"Yeah. I'm not going to be particularly quick today, I'm afraid."

"A real change, then, from your usual breakneck pace."

"Just you try and keep up." 

Malfoy snorted and turned towards the enormous wooden sign that proclaimed "Chairs 'n' Chairs," and Harry -- quite reasonably, he thought -- expected to enter a shop filled with chairs. And there were chairs, yes, but there was so much more. It smelled wonderful, the air rich with cedar, maple, blackthorn, hickory, and everywhere he looked, richly polished wooden furniture and intricate wooden baubles gleamed. There was an enormous bed carved to resemble a walnut shell, a couch with the feet of a Hippogriff, and a series of floating wooden rings that moved in and out of one anothers' orbit and was one of the most calming things Harry had seen since Hanna's bubbles. 

"Draco!"

A woman emerged from the forest of wood, extremely tall and broad-shouldered with thick dark hair down to her waist, pale skin, and a pair of enormous, exquisite hazel eyes. She was wearing lots and lots of silver jewelry placed pretty much anywhere a person could put jewelry, and when she spoke again, Harry realized she was American. 

"I was waiting for y'all out front but I got bored and went in back to make some coffee. You want?"

Draco glanced at Harry, who said, "I'd love a cup. I'm Harry, by the way."

"Betsy," she said, taking his hand in a competent grip before turning to Draco and throwing her arms around him warmly. Harry gaped. He'd never seen Draco hugged before, and couldn't have said why the sight was so transfixing. Then Betsy pushed him away and held him at arms’ length. "I'm so happy to see you!"

"Thank you for meeting us on short notice," Draco said, fondly tugging on a lock of her long hair. 

"Of _course_ , it sounds like a fascinating project, never done anything like it before!" She beamed at Harry and led them to small room at the back of the shop, which had a kettle, coffeemaker, a sink, and more wooden furniture. "Sit, sit," she said, flapping her hands. Harry did not need to be told twice. He sank into the couch, which was heavenly, and she handed him a hot cup of coffee. Draco stayed standing, leaning a hip against one of the tables. 

"How are you?" he said. 

"Oh, basically fine? I told you Mona got that fellowship in Vancouver, right? Well, so she gets there and it turns out the guy who's supposed to be supervising her project straight up _died_ the day before she arrived? So now she's like, totally stranded in the Wand Historiography department and is scrambling to try and make connections with all these extremely suspicious old people her supervisor was supposed to grease the wheels with, and -- anyway, it's just a boring academic nightmare, but she says the city's beautiful so she's just been hiking like ten hours a day. How tall are you?"

It took Harry a moment to realize this last was addressed to him. "Oh, I -- 180 centimeters, thereabouts."

"Weight?" 

"Eleven stone, ish."

"You Brits and your stones... Draco, can you give it to me in pounds?"

"Eleven... About a hundred fifty-five."

"Okay and so what you're looking for is a cane that can conceal your wand in its handle, right? With some kind of mechanism for easy access, that's what Draco told me."

Harry felt pleasantly steamrollered. "Right."

She took out her wand and accio'd a notebook and pen -- not a quill, he noticed -- and sat into a chair across from him. "Mind if I ask you a few questions? Other than the few questions I just asked you!"

"Go on."

"Okay so not to make any assumptions, but you're looking for a functional medical-grade assistive device, yeah? We're not talking like, ornamental walking cane 'cause it looks badass."

"Er, yes, the first."

"And are you going for like a traditional, historical vibe, or like a holy Merlin check me out I'm a wizard vibe, or a this is my very functional cane vibe...?"

Harry had not thought about vibes, but he was pretty sure he did not want either of the first two. "I would prefer it look... quite normal?"

"So like, high functionality, low visibility."

"Yes, exactly."

"Okay, cool, cool, good. You teach with Draco, right? So you'll be mostly indoors, with a little lawn-tromping here and there. Can I see your wand? That's what she said! No but really can I see it?"

Harry had not expected Draco to have such an ebullient friend, and over Betsy's head he was grinning at Harry like he could tell she was a surprise. Harry pulled his wand from his coat pocket and held it out hesitantly, loathe to let go; it felt oddly intimate to let someone else hold his wand. (That's what she said, supplied his treacherous brain.) Betsy took it very carefully and weighed it in her hands, and for a moment she just looked at it, her hazel eyes preternaturally focused. 

"Holly?" she said. "About eleven inches? Ugh I love how you guys just randomly use inches for shit like wands and submarine sandwiches and then you're right back to centimeters like nothing happened."

"Yes, eleven."

To his surprise, she raised it to her nose and closed her eyes. A moment later, they flew open, huge and clear. She was staring at Harry. "Phoenix?"

"Wow. How did you --?"

She whirled around to Draco. "I'm sorry, but is this _Harry fucking Potter_?" Then she whirled back to Harry. "Are you Harry fucking Potter?"

"I -- yes?"

"How are you only realizing this now?" Draco said. "Are you the only witch in the entire world who's never seen a photograph of him?"

Betsy was gazing avidly at Harry, her hazel eyes so huge Harry could've sworn they'd grown. "I mean yeah of course, duh, but also like, not recently? I have a vague cartoony image of glasses and a scar and a lot of hair, but like, his face? Not really."

Harry said, "Wait, you recognized me -- by my wand?"

"Yes are you kidding?" Betsy was holding it against her cheek now. "This is like the wand all wandmakers learn about in our first year of apprenticeship! Oh god I can't believe I'm holding the wand that dueled Voldemort, twin cores, phoenix against phoenix, I'm holding a piece of history! The things this holly wood has seen! Okay I'm almost done, sorry Harry, but meeting this wand is like meeting a fucking celebrity. Which, I guess _you're_ a celebrity, and of course it's really nice to meet you too, but your _wand_ is _in my hand_ and -- aaaaahhhh. Mona is going to actually keel over and die when I tell her I met this wand."

"Well," said Harry, "when she gets back from Vancouver, she can meet it too, if she wants."

Betsy's eyes got impossibly wider. Then they shrank back down to their normal size –- and really, was it normal how they grew and shrank like that? -– and she looked a bit calmer. "Thanks for letting me freak out," she said. "I'll do some more when you're gone, but for now, it's all business, baby. I'm gonna make a cane that's gonna hold the most famous wand of my generation, no biggie. But okay so, do you want your cane to be functional without the wand, too? Like, if you pop the wand out the cane'll still work fine?"

"That would be good. Did you say you studied wandmaking?"

"Yeah, I had my own shop back in L.A. but it got super boring. Here." Betsy was giving him back his wand, eyes misty as if parting with a dear friend. "Mind standing up? That couch is kinda deep, here, grab on."

She pulled him to his feet with a decent show of strength and then spent rather a long time measuring him, in ways that made sense and in ways that did not. She measured the length of his leg, which seemed apropos, but then measured the length of his nose, which seemed a bit beside the point. She made him stick his hand in a plate of goo to take an “impression,” then measured around his hips like she was fitting him for trousers. It was all very mysterious. 

"Hold your arms out to the side for me?" she said. "Let's see that wingspan."

Harry studiously did not look at Draco. "Sorry," he said. "I can't do that. I could pick up just the right one?"

She didn't blink, or ask why, or seem to mind at all. "Nah, no problem, it was just cosmetic, anyway. Okay so yeah I think it'll take about a week? You caught me at a good time, pre-Christmas season. In terms of payment, could I very daringly suggest a trade? Mona's gonna be back in late November, just in time for her birthday, and if you come over for dinner and show her your wand I will win the biggest Wife of the Year trophy – no, I’ll win Wife of Life!"

"I told you, I'll come show her anyway, no need to --"

"Please, like I'm gonna take money from Harry Potter. Thanks for saving us all, that'll be four hundred Galleons! Capitalism, yum." Betsy was braiding her hair as she spoke, her fingers so lightning quick that Harry had only just noticed and then suddenly she had a thick dark braid hanging over her shoulder. "I'm gonna have to kick you guys out now, sorry, I have another appointment and it's with literally the meanest man in the world, I don't want you to even hear his voice."

Now Harry was staring, because the braid had revealed Betsy's ears, which were not like any ears Harry had seen before. They were thin and long and very pointed. He saw Draco notice him noticing them, and quickly looked away as they were ushered out of the shop. He barely had time to babble a thank-you and be bone-crushingly hugged goodbye before they were on the street again, rain misting in Draco's hair. 

"What --" Harry said. 

"Yes, she has that effect on people. It's nearly four, we should get you to the Three Broomsticks."

“Is she… er…”

“Trans? Yes.”

“Stop being difficult, you know I mean her ears. And those eyes... Is she – is she quite – human?”

"No, not quite,” Malfoy said, smirking. “She's part elf."

Harry thought of the house elves he'd seen, tiny wrinkled creatures with enormous eyes. It's true her eyes had been very large, and unusually pellucid, but -- "But she's so tall!"

"She's not a house-elf. She's an Elf, no house about it. Well, her grandmother was. Like most magical creatures, they've had quite a bad time of it, been persecuted to the ends of the earth by -- well, by people like my family. They're native to the American continents and there aren't many left that are willing to mingle with wizards, so they're quite rare. Exceptionally good with wood, and great fun to drink with -- or Betsy is, at any rate. What did you – er – think of her?”

"Oh, I loved her, of course,” Harry said, “who wouldn’t?” And only when Malfoy's shoulders relaxed a bit did he realize he'd been nervous. Nervous that Harry wouldn't like his friend? The thought was oddly touching. 

"I'm glad." Malfoy glanced down at the slippery cobblestones. "Do you want to take my arm?"

Harry bit his lip. He had a few answers to this question. The first, most automatic answer, was a resounding NO, and it came with a lot of outrage and embarrassment. Another was a YES that was flavoured with the reasonable fear of falling over. The third was a YES because Malfoy had very nice arms and Harry wouldn't mind holding on to one of them. Yesses won out. 

"If you don't mind? I really am slow at the moment."

"I offered, didn't I?"

Harry took the arm and they set off, as promised, very slowly. Harry could hear the shouts of his students from somewhere in the region of Honeydukes and it struck him as absolutely ludicrous that he was walking arm-in-arm with Draco Malfoy of all people, through Hogsmeade. Draco Malfoy, who'd poisoned Katie Bell just over there. Who'd thrown rocks at Harry down that street there. Who was being so careful with him right now, right here, walking so slowly, not seeming to mind that Harry was a lurching, stiff-legged, proper mess of a man. 

How had this happened? How had they become _friends_? How was he going to break this to Ron?

"Right," Draco said (and when had he started thinking of him as Draco? What was happening?). "I'll leave you here. Have a nice time with that gingery child you're so fond of, and his little daughter."

"Thank you for introducing me to Betsy," Harry said. "If the cane comes through, you won't have to be hauling me through the streets anymore."

"Sorry she went so barmy about the wand for a minute, by the way -- I should've warned her. I forgot that you were -- you."

"That's the nicest thing anyone's ever said to me," Harry said. The rain was falling more thickly now, big fat drops that slid down the back of Harry's coat and made him shiver. They were standing outside the Three Broomsticks and he could hear laughter coming from inside, could anticipate the warmth and the smoky smell and the taste of mead, and how good it would be to see Ron and Hermione and Rosie. But despite all that, despite the rain, he found that he was in no hurry.

"I very much doubt that," Draco said. He was still gripping Harry's arm, as if worried -- or reluctant -- to let him go. "Well," he said, "I--"

Just then, Harry heard a familiar tiny high-pitched scream, like a teakettle, and turned to find Jacob and his gaggle of third years staring at them. When Harry and Draco looked at them, they clutched each other and gasped and began laughing.

"What in the name of the Morrigan is wrong with them?" Draco said. He'd let go of Harry's arm.

"Haven't the foggiest," Harry said faintly. 

"See you back at the castle," Draco said, and strode off on those long, long legs.


	7. Chapter 7

The Three Broomsticks was absolutely packed, and Harry stood in the doorway for a moment, shaking rain from his hair and looking around for his friends. It was blessedly dry and warm, and a ceiling of floating candles gave the whole room a bright glow that made Harry want to climb into an armchair and cover himself with a blanket. He caught a glint of bright copper back in a corner, and grinned: he'd know Ron's hair anywhere. Carefully he made his way through the people crowded at the bar and wove through the tabletops to where Ron was sitting at a small, circular table, Rosie on his knee, pint already half-finished in front of him. He was frowning at a newspaper and bouncing his daughter absentmindedly, but he seemed to sense Harry's presence from a few feet away and glanced up, face splitting in a delighted grin. 

"There you are!"

"Sorry," Harry said, looking around for a chair. "Everything's all slippery, I had to go about half a kilometer an hour just to stay upright."

"Why didn't you apparate?"

Harry stared, then broke out laughing. "You know, I'd forgotten it was even a possibility. You get used to going without, at Hogwarts. Where's Hermione?"

"Had to run to the office but she'll be here shortly. Let's get you sitting down so you can hold this baby and I can fetch you a drink." Ron turned to the fellow at the next table. "Oy, give us your chair, would you?"

"No," the man said affronted, "Get your own bloody chair."

"You know who this is?" Ron said, gesturing. "It's Harry sodding Potter; you won't give Harry Potter your chair, after what he's sacrificed for us?"

"Ron," Harry pleaded, but the man was already standing up -- and up, and up. He was very tall, very muscled, very bearded, and he was scowling down at Harry. 

"Sorry," the man said, with a little bow, "meant no disrespect. Thanks for your service."

"I hate when you do that," Harry muttered to Ron, unLocking his knee so he could sit down, and trying not to groan as he bent it beneath him. But he couldn't stay mad, because Rosie had screeched at the sight of him and was reaching out with fat, freckled arms. "Hello, pet. Oh, Merlin, you've gotten even cuter, how's that possible?"

"George reckons she's the ugliest toddler he's ever seen," Ron said with some satisfaction, "but still he's got pictures of her all over his office. Here." He deposited Rosie unceremoniously into Harry's lap and Harry buried his face gladly in her chubby neck. "What'll you have?"

"Whatever you've been drinking."

He vanished into the crowd and Harry took a moment to enjoy the scene. It was the first time in months that he wasn't outnumbered twenty to one by adolescents, and though he did spot a few of his students perched at the mismatched tables, it was a pleasure to be surrounded by grown-ups. He wouldn't have said no to a bit more eye candy, but Hogsmeade was a village of families, and young single wizards and witches made up a low percentage of the demographic. Actually, the bloke who'd given up his chair hadn't been half bad, but he'd gone off elsewhere. A shame; Harry longed for just five minutes of the kind of eye contact he never got at Hogwarts, the glance across the room, the mutual sizing-up, the fizzy feeling of possibility even if it never amounted to anything. Harry loved to flirt and the weight of his flirtation deprivation was only just now becoming clear to him. 

Unless you counted Malfoy. But Harry wasn't _flirting_ with Malfoy, per se, was he?

"Your Uncle Harry's going a bit mental, locked up in that castle," Harry said to Rosie. She cackled and then lurched backwards with more strength than seemed possible in that slight body, and he tightened his grip with his good arm, bad arm draped across her lap. The hard thing about holding a baby with one working hand was that it didn't leave any room for a wand, and he had a surge of fear imagining what would happen if someone attacked at just that moment. He wouldn't be able to defend Rosie without dropping her, which would defeat the point, and what was Ron thinking, leaving her with Harry? He was in no shape to watch out for a child. He felt a brief crackling panic that seemed to flow through him like hot wind... but then he caught sight of Ron coming back and felt first better, and then silly for his interlude of paranoia. 

Ron thunked the pints down on the table and thunked himself down in his chair, grinning at Harry. "So, Professor Potter, tell me everything. What's it like being on the other side of the desk? Do you feel mad with power?"

"I feel as if I can't hold a baby and a pint at the same time," Harry said, twitching the useless fingers of his left hand in demonstration. "D'you mind--"

"Here we go, love," Ron said, reaching out for his daughter. He gripped her beneath her armpits and tugged, then frowned. Tugged again. She wouldn't budge. "Harry, did you put a Sticking charm on my child?"

"What? No!" He thought of that crackle of panic, and winced. "At least, not intentionally."

Ron raised an eyebrow. "That's been happening?"

"No," Harry said, going a bit red. "Not until just now."

Ron didn't push it and Harry was grateful. "Well, she's good and Stuck," he said. "UnStick her if you want to give her back, but if you want to keep her I reckon you could let her go to drink your pint, after all. She's not going anywhere."

Experimentally, Harry released her to reach for his glass. She gave another strong lurch and wriggle, but Ron was right: she was perfectly secure. For once, his accidental spellcasting had done something useful instead of destructive. "I'll keep her."

Ron looked up, then, and waved, and Harry turned to see Hermione rushing towards them, holding a glass of wine and looking rather chic in an ankle-length trench coat and silk scarf. She was on them in an instant, swooping down to kiss Harry and then Rosie. 

"Hello, darlings!" she said. "Oh, Harry, it's lovely to see you! You're looking thin, aren't they feeding you?"

"Wish she'd say that to me," Ron said, patting what was, admittedly, a bit of a belly. 

"It's all the exercise," Harry said. "Running around that bloody great castle."

She dashed away to grab a chair from a nearby table and then sat down beside Harry, absentmindedly grabbing hold of her daughter's little socked foot and bending to kiss it. "How are you faring? How's your health?"

"Sod his health," said Ron. "I want the gossip. What's it like working with Malfoy? Do the students loathe him? Have they made up any nasty rhymes about him?"

Harry willed himself not to flush. "Er -- he's quite popular, actually. Even has a bit of a fanclub." 

"All Slytherins, though, I bet," Ron said. 

"Actually, no," said Harry. "Believe me, I wish I could sit here and happily tell you how awful he is, but... he's been decidedly... not."

Ron looked crestfallen. 

"Has he been making your potions?" Hermione wanted to know.

"Yeah, and he's tweaked the recipe, actually. They're much better now."

"He's probably poisoning you slowly," Ron said darkly. "A potion to make you think he's halfway decent."

"I know this sounds quite unbelievable," Harry said. "You know me, I was ready to hate him as much as I ever had, but... I really do think he's done a lot to try and... change. He's broken with almost everyone in his past."

"He's been living in France, hasn't he?" Hermione said. "I met a French Healer at a meeting last week who spoke so highly of him I had to repeat his name a few times to make sure we were talking of the same person."

"This is the biggest disappointment of my week," Ron said. "I was so looking forward to an hour of pure abuse, just like old times."

"Oh, but if you want gossip," said Harry, "did you know Narcissa Malfoy is living with Muggles?"

Ron sat up, eyes glowing. "No!"

They sat in the pub for nearly five hours, though Ron left briefly to bring Rosie home to where George had agreed to come by and put her to bed. They ordered food, and drinks, and then more food and drinks, until Harry was quite thoroughly sloshed and Hermione was sitting on Ron's lap and eating a plate of chips with the determination of the very drunk. 

Several times someone had approached them with a tentative, "Hello, Minister, I was wanting to ask --", and each time, whoever was behind the bar flicked their wand and a blaring neon sign lit up above Hermione's head: "No one bothers the Minister while she's drinking, HOUSE RULES."

"I told them they didn't have to do that," Hermione said tipsily, "but actually I quite appreciate it."

Harry stood up every now and then to Lock his knee and take a turn around the pub so his traitorous body wouldn't stiffen too badly, and though his passage was watched covertly and followed by whispers, overall it seemed people had learned from the HOUSE RULES and did not try and approach him, over than to nod a little and smile when they caught his eye. Like Hermione, he appreciated it. 

Ron had nobly agreed to be that evening's Appointed Apparator, so he switched to Butterbeer around dinnertime and was relatively sober by the time they were ready to go. He took his wife first, Hermione's arms twined around his neck as she sloppily attempted to kiss his nose, then came back for Harry, who'd been attempting to Lock his knee but kept misfiring.

"You're smashed," Ron said fondly, taking out his own wand. "Here, hold still. Okay, up we get."

It took two tries to get Harry to his feet, but they managed eventually and Ron slung his arm around Harry's shoulders.

"Don't splinch me," Harry said, pronouncing his words very carefully lest he slur them. "I'm damaged enough without you taking off my eyebrow."

"You ever going to let me forget that?" Ron said, and with a crack they were in the cottage. George was sitting up on the couch, yawning, but Hermione was nowhere to be seen.

"Ah, she's upstairs crying over Rosie's crib," said George, when Ron asked. "You know how she gets when she's drunk. All right, Harry?"

"Yeah, good to sh--see you."

"Oh, you're soused too, are you?" George said, grinning. 

"You made me into a _cos_ tume," Harry accused. 

"A _best-selling_ costume," George corrected, as Hermione came back into the living room, her eyes damp. 

"We made such a beautiful baby," she said tearfully, draping herself into Ron's patient arms. 

"Motherhood," George said. "It really puts the blinders on."

"She's identical to you when you were a baby, Georgie," Hermione said, and there was a brief silence, everyone thinking of and grieving the other person who'd been identical to George. Hermione let out a loud sniffle. "Let's have another, Ron, do let's."

"Harry," Ron said loudly, "we've got a new couch for you to kip on, look. Cubile!"

The sofa, which Harry now saw was not the green velvet one he'd come to know, sprang open like a book and the cushions rearranged themselves into pillows, blankets settling atop the mattress, from couch to bed in an instant. It was a beautiful piece of furniture, all gleaming bright wood and soft blue cushions. Harry tottered over, unLocked his knee, and fell backwards into it. 

"Did Be--" he paused, hiccuped "--Betsy make this?"

"The Chairs 'n' Chairs woman? Yeah, how'd you know?"

"Making me a cane," he said. "Put my -- my wand in it."

"Oh!" said Hermione. "That's brilliant!"

"Malfoy thought of it," Harry said. " _He's_ brilliant."

George's brows shot up. "Doth my one remaining ear deceive me? Malfoy? Are we talking about _Draco_ Malfoy?"

"Yeah," Ron said, trying to get Hermione to drink a glass of water. "He's bewitched Harry into thinking he's all right."

"But Harry says, Harry says the students love him, and that says a lot about a person, I think," she said, then beamed in Harry's direction. "Neville told me in an owl that they also love you, Harry. He said you're a smash hit, those were his exact words! Oh, I adore Neville."

"The students," Harry said dreamily, "think we're dating, me and Malfoy."

Ron coughed. "Excuse me?"

George let out a bellow of laughter. "Oh, this is rich. Tell us more, Harry, go on."

But Harry couldn't. He was too distracted trying to extricate himself from his coat, in which he'd gotten hopelessly tangled. "Fuck. George, I'll trade you -- my left ear for your left arm."

"So tempting, but no. There you go, mate, you've got it."

Harry had succeeded in removing his coat, and was now succeeding in lying down. "Okay," he murmured. "Good night."

"Harry," said George. "Do professors not take their shoes off to sleep, these days?"

"Oh, leave him, he looks so sweet," said Hermione.

Ron said something as well, but Harry didn't hear it. He was already asleep.

:::

"I fell asleep," Harry said. "I did not _pass out_.

"You should be ashamed," Ron said. "Hermione held her liquor better than you!"

"She's not holding it very well now, though, is she?" said Harry, and right on cue, there was a retching sound from the bathroom off the kitchen. 

Ron winced. "Hang on, darling!" he shouted, going over to the cupboard. "I'm going to whip you up a Hair of the Dog potion!"

Harry groaned and clapped his hands over his ears. "Lower your volume, Ron, please. My head can't take it."

"I'll make some potion for you too, don't worry. Unless you'd prefer to wait and have the brilliant Malfoy do it for you."

Harry felt a flicker of anxiety. "Did I say he was brilliant?"

"More than once."

"What -- er -- what else did I say?"

"Why?" said Ron. "Scared you might've been a bit too honest?"

After all these years, Harry knew when Ron was joking, and he saw now that Ron was only teasing, not realizing that he was edging towards an uncomfortable truth. "Yeah," Harry said. "I'm worried I might've told you about me and McGonagall."

"Oh, don't," Hermione moaned, coming out of the bathroom. Ron added a pinch of something red to whatever he was making and then handed a glass each to Harry and Hermione. Hermione drank it immediately, so Harry took a tentative sip, as well. 

It tasted of licorice and salamanders, but it did the trick marvelously. His aching head stopped throbbing, his stomach settled, his slight mist of boozy sweat began to dry. 

"Cheers," Harry said, "that's really good, actually."

"What d'you want to do today?" Ron asked. "Any Hogsmeade sights you're dying to re-visit in your few hours of freedom?"

"Honestly?" Harry said. "What I'd really like to do is maybe sit in one place and not move."

Ron laughed, but Hermione looked anxious. 

"How come you had your knee Locked, yesterday?" she said. "Has it been bothering you?"

"Hermione, it's always bothering me."

"You're bothering him, too," said Ron. "And in point of fact, 'Mione, you could do with a day of sitting about, as well. Harry's not the only one looking a bit ragged." He ducked, laughing, as Hermione threw a spoon at him. "Why don't you two working stiffs get comfortable in the living room, and I'll make breakfast before the baby's up from her nap."

This idea was more than agreeable to Harry, and Hermione reluctantly complied, after Ron had pried a folder of paperwork out of her grasping hands. She lit a fire in the hearth and curled up in the armchair, while Harry stretched out on the bed-turned-couch with his bad leg up and his bad arm on a pillow across his stomach. Despite Hermione's propensity to over-worry, their house was still the place he felt most comfortable being himself -- this new self, the one who wanted to sit in front of a roaring fire instead of tromp around town; the self who couldn't tie his own shoes anymore but had no trouble demonstrating a nonverbal Undetectable Extension Charm on Rosie's diaper bag when Hermione requested it.

"You're the one who taught me that spell," Harry said, "you could've done it just as well yourself."

"Yes," Hermione said, "but it's one of the trickiest charms to get right at the best of times, and I can't even nonverbal a simple Lumos charm. I just love watching you do it, it's like going to a show."

"How would you know?" Ron said, handing her an enormous plateful of eggs and sausage and pancakes. "We haven't been to a bloody show in ages. All we do anymore is stare at Rosie. Sit up, Harry, you'll choke if you try and eat like that."

Harry was so deep in the couch that it was difficult to drag himself up against the arm, but he managed it, and Ron set the plate down on his lap. Then he tapped it with his wand and muttered, "Defindo mordere," and the sausages and pancakes cut themselves neatly into many, many, many teeny-tiny pieces. 

"Oh, drat," Ron said. "I forgot you're not a baby."

"Gee, thanks," Harry said, spearing a baby-sized bite of pancake with his fork. "Appreciate the gesture, though."

A charm-Amplified scream echoed through the house, and Ron hurried to get Rosie from her crib. 

"Isn't it odd," said Hermione, "how good he is at this? The house-husband thing?"

"Well, he learned from the best," Harry said, thinking of Molly. 

"There's downsides to having a parent like that," Hermione said. "None of his siblings can so much as make themselves a sandwich."

"Did I tell you what Ginny made me for dinner when I visited her in Oslo? While she was reporting on the Cup?"

Hermione was already smiling. "Oh no."

"She opened a tin of --" Harry was laughing too hard to get the words out properly "-- a tin of -- smoked -- of smoked herring -- and put it in a pot with -- oh, Merlin -- hot milk, and then added -- added -- uncooked potatoes and --" He couldn't go on. 

"Oh stop, oh don't, I'm going to vomit again," Hermione begged. She was shaking with laughter. "She always has sensible names for such horrors, what was she calling this?"

"Fish --" Harry dropped his fork, he was laughing so hard "--Fish stew!"

Ron came back into the room, Rosie draped over his shoulder, to find them both bent double, weeping with hilarity. He looked at them indulgently. "What's got you two so giddy?"

"Ron," gasped Hermione, "Ron, tell Harry about the time -- the time Ginny made you -- ahahahaha -- made you --"

"Bangers and mash?" Ron said, grinning. "With the uncooked frankfurters and instant oatmeal?"

"No, no, the -- the spaghetti!"

"Right," Ron said, settling himself on the couch at Harry's feet. "Well, she did technically have pasta, only it was ramen noodles -- and she did technically have tomato sauce, only it was ketchup -- but what she _didn't_ have was the foggiest clue how to boil water."

"No," Harry said, "please no, you'll actually kill me --"

"That's exactly what I said when she tried to serve me a plate of that stuff!"

It was, overall, the best day Harry'd had since he'd gone swimming with Malfoy. He wrangled another thestral-drawn carriage back to Hogwarts at nine that evening, and returned to find his own chambers feeling very empty, and echoing, and lonely. It was no wonder, he thought as he climbed between the blankets of his enormous bed, that his professors had mostly been quite old. Hogwarts was no place for a hot-blooded young person. 

Except, of course, for the hundreds of hot-blooded young people slumbering several floors below him. It was definitely the place for them. 

Harry sighed, staring up at the canopy. He hadn't expected to feel so _old_ here. He might move like an old man, but he was still young, wasn't he? Still in his prime? 

What he needed going forward, he decided, was more fun.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a bit of a short one but I hope you enjoy it. Also, I might have to skip a day or two of posting depending on how much of my Real Life I get managed this weekend, so fair warning! Thank you for reading <3

"Fun?" said Malfoy, as if he'd never heard the word before. 

"Yes," Harry said staunchly. "We've got this massive, magical castle at our disposal, but all we ever do is grade papers and trudge around the lake."

" _You_ trudge," Malfoy said.

"There are some mushrooms in the greenhouse that make you think you're an elephant," Neville suggested. "We could take those? For a lark?"

Harry cocked his head speculatively but Malfoy said, "Are you mad? If this one starts tromping around as if he's an elephant he'll never walk again."

Both Harry and Neville conceded that this was a good point. The three of them were in Malfoy's office on the Friday night following Hogsmeade, drinking what was apparently a very expensive and high-quality bottle of Cabernet, though to Harry it just tasted like red wine. Malfoy had his feet on the desk and his hair was uncharacteristically mussed, a sight that made Harry feel oddly dizzy. It made him want to call him Draco out loud, just to see how it felt, and he doubled-down on his mental commitment to sticking with _Malfoy._ Things got weird in his head when he started thinking along the lines of _Draco_.

"Well, I think _this_ is fun," Neville said. 

"Do you not remember what we used to get up to around here?" Harry demanded. "Sneaking out of bed at all hours, exploring the castle --"

"Nearly getting ourselves killed at every turn, yeah, I think I recall." Neville sipped his wine. "You were the mastermind back then, Harry, so go on -- suggest something."

Which was how they ended up in front of the Room of Requirement at 11 o'clock at night, staring at the door in fixed concentration. On Harry's orders, they were all thinking _I require fun_ as hard as they could. 

"You open the door, Harry," Neville said. "It's always liked you."

Harry nodded grimly and took a deep breath. He stepped forward, then glanced back over his shoulder. Neville and Malfoy both made encouraging faces. He gripped the doorknob. He opened the door. 

A moment later, Malfoy was laughing harder than Harry'd ever seen him do. "Of course," he gasped, "of course this is your idea of fun!"

"I don't -- what are we even looking at?" Neville said, looking round in confusion. 

"I'm not sure, myself," Harry said, totally bewildered.

The enormous space had been divided into sections, some parts dark and swampy and vegetal like the marsh in the Forbidden Forest, some parts completely foreign-looking, like a patch of sand with what appeared to be an amphora sticking out of it. There was even a sectioned-off indoor bit that greatly resembled someone's parlor. At the very far end of the space, Harry could just make out what looked like a table set with party hats and bottles of liquor. 

Malfoy, however, was still laughing. "It's -- oh, Potter, you'll be the death of me -- it's an -- an obstacle course! And I'm sure it's absolutely filled with horrible, monstrous things we have to vanquish. Look, look there, lurking with the tropical flowers, it's a fucking _Lethifold,_ Merlin have mercy! Only the most powerful Patronus can defeat it, so thank _goodness_ we're with Potter, who can send his -- his -- oh, it hurts -- his _stag_ to save us, ahahahahaha."

Malfoy was still laughing when Neville, who clearly -- and reasonably -- seemed not amused but properly terrified, yanked them back and slammed the door. 

Harry nearly protested -- if it really was an obstacle course, he'd have liked to give it a go! -- but then realized how much more ammunition he'd be giving Malfoy if he admitted to this, and kept a dignified silence instead. 

"Right," Harry said, when Malfoy's hilarity (and Neville's trembles) had wound down. "Er, Neville, maybe you ought to open the door."

Neville's room was indistinguishable from the Hogwarts greenhouse. They closed the door again.

"This is a lot of pressure," Malfoy said, when they looked to him. "Not to mention perhaps more psychologically revealing than I'd bargained for. What if there's a sex dungeon in there?"

Harry choked. 

"Well, at least it will be a new experience for me," Neville said optimistically. 

Malfoy grinned and opened the door. 

It was not a sex dungeon. It was not a dungeon at all. It was an elegant room with windows that looked out over the night sky, everything made of dark shining wood and velvet. To one side was a bar with three green high-backed velvet stools and what looked like a very well-stocked liquor cabinet; on the other side was an old-fashioned record player with an enormous stack of records. There were several plush couches, a bookshelf full of what looked like board games, and, in the center of the room, a billiards table with the balls already racked and ready. 

"Oh, well done, Draco," Neville said admiringly. 

"Bit tame," said Harry, but he was already going inside to explore. Malfoy looked deeply pleased with himself and went immediately behind the bar.

"What'll you have?" he said. "There's a book of cocktail recipes back here."

Harry was distracted -- he'd strayed to a bookshelf and discovered a stack of antique magazines, their photos moving in that blurry, disjointed fashion old photos had, and they were unequivocally a 1920s version of gay pornography. He was absolutely too horny to handle looking at the photos for any longer than necessary, and too horny, also, to fully process the implications -- which seemed to decisively point, once and for all, to the fact that Malfoy was, indeed, interested in blokes. 

"A margarita!" Neville said happily. "No salt."

"Er -- dealer's choice," Harry said, tearing himself away from the magazines. He went to the bar and pulled himself up onto a stool, anticipating a world of discomfort, but discovered that beneath the bartop was a raised wooden step on which he could prop his feet. It warmed him greatly that even in Malfoy's subconscious he was thinking of Harry's comfort. 

Malfoy mixed Neville's margarita -- rather expertly, Harry thought -- and then made Harry something that tasted a bit like Malfoy smelled, woodsy and ambered. It was bitter on the tongue but sweet as it went down. Harry loved it. 

Neville put on a record of a Muggle band from the 70s with a soulful female vocalist and Malfoy found a deck of cards. They bet drinks instead of galleons, and rather quickly, Harry was rather drunk. Twice in a week! Someone, hold him back! After several hands of cards, Malfoy and Neville transitioned to the billiards table and Harry sat back in an armchair, drinking another Malfoy original cocktail and planning to watch them play. 

He'd used to like billiards, and he let himself get a bit melancholy for a moment about all the things he'd used to like and couldn't do anymore, but then Malfoy said, "Potter, your turn."

"Not bloody likely," he said. 

"C'mon, Harry," said Neville. "You're aces at billiards!"

"I _was_ ," he corrected. "That was before half my body quit working."

"He's too competitive to play a game he knows he'll lose," Malfoy told Neville. And Harry, Harry _knew_ he was being baited, he was sure of it -- but damned if it wasn't effective bait. 

"I don't care if I lose," Harry protested.

"Then come and have a go," Malfoy said, holding out a cue. 

Harry gave in. If Neville hadn't noticed by now that his arm was as buggered as his leg, well, no time like the present. He pushed himself back to his feet and took the cue in his good hand, moving round the table looking for the easiest shot. There -- the striped 9 was lined up pretty well for a corner pocket. He positioned his left hand gingerly on the table and, trying very hard to keep his balance, sank down as far as he could until his shoulder couldn't take it anymore, which wasn't very far at all, unfortunately. It didn't help that his one-legged stance was putting undue pressure on the joint to support him against the table.

"Is it cheating if I ask you to hang onto my good shoulder?" Harry asked Malfoy. "Just to keep me up?"

"Is it cheating?" Malfoy asked Neville solemnly. Neville shook his head no, seeming totally unsurprised by Harry's reference to his good arm, so maybe Malfoy was right after all and everyone already knew, and it wasn't actually as big a deal as it'd felt a few months ago. Malfoy's hand on his shoulder was firm and supportive and it steadied him enough to take some weight off his other arm. His bad hand lay curled palm-up like a dead mouse, but he managed to crook his fingers enough to thread the cue through them. 

He took a moment to sight his target and aim, then he took a deep breath, and let the cue ball fly. It knocked into the 9 with a satisfying _clunk_ , and the 9 shot across the billiards table -- in completely the wrong direction. It careened off several other balls and came to rest complacently by a pocket on the other side. 

"Terrible," Malfoy said. "You're on Neville's team."

"I'm glad to have him," Neville said loyally. 

Harry turned, grinning. He found he did not care if he was terrible -- he was glad just to be playing. And anyway, not all his shots were as bad as the first. They weren't nearly as good as they'd once been, but although he and Neville were sorely beaten by Malfoy, it was as much Neville's fault as his, and he sank enough balls to make it feel like he was getting somewhere. 

Besides, even at his best he probably could not have beat Malfoy, who played pool with a kind of lean, focused intensity. Watching him made Harry feel oddly like he wasn't getting enough air. Malfoy was graceful as always, but there was a restrained power in the way he handled the cue stick, gently at first until he was certain of his target, and then with total confidence.

They had another round of drinks and played another game, Harry and Neville again against Malfoy, and again they were soundly trounced. 

"Enough for me," Harry said, "or I won't be able to move this arm at all tomorrow."

It was freeing to admit it aloud, and they all three retired to the sofas, Neville on one and Harry and Malfoy on the other. Neville began dozing almost as soon as he'd sat down and Harry, for the first time in hours, checked his watch.

"It's 4am!" he said, shocked. 

"Up all night," Malfoy said, languidly reclined with an arm draped casually across the back of the couch. "Does this mean we've had 'fun,' by your standards?"

"It'd have been better if we were, oh, seventy year-olds," Harry said, grinning. "But yeah, it'll do."

"Admit it," Malfoy said. "You would've loved to've gone up against that Lethifold."

"Well..." Harry hedged. 

"It's all right," Malfoy said. "I would've liked to've watched you beat it."

Harry felt his neck get hot, and he took a hasty drink of his cocktail. "You mean see me get walloped."

"No," said Malfoy, with total certainty, and shifted position a bit, just enough that his knee and Harry's knee were touching. Malfoy's blue eyes were heavy-lidded with drink and with the late hour but he was looking at Harry very intently, the same kind of intentness he'd recently shown at the billiards table, like a man about to aim, and win. Suddenly Harry's heart was beating very fast. 

He didn't know whether he was relieved or bereft when Neville let out an enormous snort and blinked awake, groggily checking his own watch. 

"Blimey," he said, "I've got to get to bed!"

The pressure of Draco's knee against Harry's was gone, and Harry's leg felt cold where it had been. 

"Yeah," said Harry, "Yeah, I ought to -- do that -- also."

"This was excellent," Neville said cheerfully. "We should do this again. Next time I'll try to think less about plants when I open the door. And Harry, maybe you could think less about -- er -- about monsters."

"It's not the monsters he likes," Draco said, still looking at Harry. "It's the challenge."


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I did tag this as a Slow Burn, right? Okay, good, no one can accuse me of false advertising ;)

On Monday of that week, Harry received an owl from Betsy informing him that his new cane was ready. It also informed him that she'd eaten cake for breakfast, that she was thinking of making a violin that played bird songs, and that she'd recently read an excellent Muggle novel about a Black woman who'd traveled back in time and been forced to reckon with both the legacy of American slavery and her white slave-owning ancestors, and did Harry think it was possible the author had gotten her hands on a time-turner? 

Malfoy smiled when Harry showed him the letter over breakfast. "She does go on a bit, doesn't she?"

"D’you think McGonagall would let me go down this weekend?” Harry said. It was an infuriating part of the job that the professors were not only teachers, but de facto guardians, and getting leave to abandon their charges was a long, tedious, and often unsuccessful process. 

"I think she'd let you go tomorrow," Malfoy said. "It's a medical reason, she can't very well say no. Betsy closes shop at eight so you'd have plenty of time after class."

"But then you wouldn't be able to come," Harry said. Then hastened to add, "I'd feel badly seeing your friend if you couldn't see her, too."

"Oh,” Malfoy said, looking pleased, “I don't think I'd have trouble getting permission to accompany you, if you – if you wanted me to. I think you underestimate how badly McGonagall feels about how difficult your first few months have been."

Harry wanted to protest that he didn’t need McGonagall’s pity, but then he reflected that perhaps it wasn't so awful for him to take whatever possible perks his injury might afford him -- Merlin knew there wasn't much else to make up for it. "I'll send her the request right now," he said, digging parchment and a quill out of his bag. 

“Draco,” Neville said. “I think that little owl’s got something for you.”

A very small barn owl was hopping up and down in front of Malfoy’s breakfast plate, a letter in its beak. Malfoy took the letter, frowning. It was a lovely envelope, cream-colored and embossed with a faint floral sheen – a wedding invitation, perhaps? Malfoy had already unsealed the flap before Harry saw a faint wisp of smoke and realized what was happening. 

“ _BLOOD TRAITOR_ ,” shrieked the Howler, the horrible roar of it echoing through the entire Great Hall. “ _YOU WILL JOIN YOUR FATHER. BLOOD TRAITOR. YOU WILL JOIN YOUR FATHER. BLOOD TRAITOR. YOU WILL JOIN YOUR FATHER._

All across the room, people had thrown their hands up over their ears and students were cowering beneath the tables, but Draco just sat there, jaw set, waiting for the sound to die off. When it had, he picked up the slightly-smoking envelope, put it in his pocket, and stood to leave. There were two vivid spots of color in his cheeks but the rest of his face was deathly pale. 

“Wait,” Harry said. “Give me the letter.”

Malfoy looked at him, expressionless. “Why.”

“Because this shouldn’t be happening to you, that’s why,” Harry said. “Whoever’s sent it didn’t use a standard Howler envelope, so I might be able to trace the stationary or the spell and find out who–”

“It doesn’t matter,” Malfoy said. “It’s just some piece of pureblood scum.”

“Give it to me,” Harry repeated. He put steel into his voice and although he was aware of other people’s eyes on them, he didn’t break his gaze from Malfoy’s. After a moment, Malfoy shrugged minutely and gave Harry that treacherously lovely envelope. Harry nodded and stowed it in his bag and Malfoy left, shoulders slightly hunched and squared against the stares of his students. 

“I didn’t know that was still happening to him,” Neville said unhappily. “Poor bloke. D’you really think you can figure out who’s been sending them?”

“I don’t know,” Harry said. “But I can certainly try.”

:::

Malfoy, it turned out, had been correct. McGonagall granted both of them leave from the castle for the entire evening, so they agreed to meet on the bridge the following day after class. It was just past six when Harry made it out of the castle, and the mid-October air was chilly but clear, the sun hovering soft above the tree line and casting everything in the rosy, forgiving light of late afternoon. Malfoy’s hair was so golden it looked burnished and Harry thought he suddenly understood all the fuss about blondes. 

“Did you get a carriage?” Malfoy asked. 

“No,” Harry said. “The leg’s feeling all right and it’s so nice out, I thought we’d walk.” His leg was not, in fact, feeling particularly all right, but the weather was gorgeous and the autumn light was glowing and he wanted to walk with Malfoy through the countryside, his leg be damned. 

“Are you sure?” Malfoy said, and his doubt only made Harry feel more certain. 

“Absolutely,” he declared. 

“All right,” Malfoy said. “Been sitting behind a desk all day, I could do with some exercise.”

“You’re not still swimming in the mornings, are you?” Harry asked as they set out across the bridge. 

“I am,” said Malfoy. 

“Aren’t you absolutely freezing?”

“Yes, but it’s not intolerable yet. Last year I managed until early November.”

“Ah, so you’re a masochist.”

Malfoy shook his head. “It isn’t masochism if you like it, is it?”

“Er, I think that’s exactly what masochism is.”

“Hmm,” said Malfoy, and Harry smiled to himself. 

The smile was wiped off his face, however, when he saw the group of students clustered at the end of the bridge. It was Jacob and his third-year army. They had textbooks and parchment out and seemed to be studying in the fresh air, and he hoped maybe they’d be so serious and concentrated that they wouldn’t pay any mind to Harry and Malfoy passing through their little group – but this hope was dashed almost immediately. Jacob glanced up and saw them coming, and urgently began speaking to his friends. Even from nearly twenty feet away Harry could see them all look up like hunting dogs on the scent. 

“Here we go,” he muttered. Malfoy gave him a questioning look that Harry pretended not to see, and a moment later, they were in the thick of it. 

“Hi professors!” Jacob said. 

“Hi!” “Hi Professors!” “Hello!” squealed Jacob’s minions. 

“All right?” Harry said, trying to get through them as quickly as possible. 

“Where are you going?” Jacob said. “Are you just taking a lovely walk on a beautiful evening?” 

“No,” Harry said, as Malfoy said, “Yes.”

“We’re going to Hogsmeade,” Harry said. He did not want the students to get the wrong idea and think he and Malfoy were on some sort of romantic stroll – but the truth seemed to make things even worse. 

“Oh!” Jacob said, his whole small face suffused with joy. “Are you going out to dinner?”

“No,” Harry said emphatically, as Malfoy said, to Harry, “We will need to eat.”

“We are conducting business,” Harry said. “For the school. Very official, professorial business, strictly academic.” As he spoke, he realized that he was only digging himself deeper. Anything he said to these children was immediately seized upon and dramatically misconstrued. 

“Of course you are,” said Jacob. “We completely understand. Very official.” He winked extravagantly. 

“Your coat is nice, Professor Potter,” said one of the girls. “It’s the same color as your eyes, did you know?”

Harry did know, it was why he was wearing it, but he couldn’t very well say that. “Thank you for telling me.”

“Did you notice, Professor Malfoy?” the girl said, turning to Draco. “That it’s just the same color as his eyes?”

“Er – I suppose I did notice,” said Malfoy, and even in his own torment Harry took pleasure from seeing prim and proper Malfoy grow discomfited. He did not, however, take pleasure in the wave of thrilled giggles this comment brought about. “Well, they’re an unusual color,” Malfoy continued, clearly trying to assert logic in the face of all this silliness. “Very green.”

“So green!” Jacob cried.

“Glad we’re in agreement,” Malfoy said. “Now, if you’ll excuse us, back to studying for you – and Franny, you’ll want to turn that diagram the other way round. Remember what I said the other day? Purple on top –”

“Potion to mop,” Franny finished. “Yes, Professor Malfoy.”

“Have a wonderful evening!” Jacob called after them. “I hope it’s a night to remember!”

Malfoy waited until they’d finished crossing the bridge, had made it down the small set of stairs, and were walking across the green towards Hogsmeade before he spoke. 

“Potter,” he said. “I feel as if I’m missing something.”

“They think we’re dating,” Harry blurted out. 

“Think we’re – oh.” Malfoy actually stumbled, and for once it was Harry who had to reach out and steady him. “Oh. _Oh._ Oh, bloody hell, that explains a lot, actually.”

“I’m sorry,” Harry felt he had to say. “It was the sodding Floo system, they worked out that we’re the only ones who have private Floos, and… and you know, kids, they jump to conclusions, and…” He stopped talking, because Draco had gone very pink, and pink was a distractingly fetching color on him. 

“Right,” Draco said. “Well, this is embarrassing.”

Harry couldn’t help but feel stung by this, but he tried not to let it show. 

“I suppose it’s natural, to be curious about your professors,” Harry said. “But – I don’t think _I_ ever was, at least not in this sense. I had all sorts of questions about Dumbledore, of course, but neither his nor McGonagall’s nor _any_ one’s romantic status ever even occurred to me.”

“Children are much more imaginative these days,” said Draco darkly. 

“There was that one rumor,” Harry remembered, “about Filch and Madam Pince, but I don’t remember being… you know… _excited_ about it. We used to talk about it just to horrify ourselves, it was a lark, you know. But these kids seem… quite invested.”

“They must be bored,” Draco said. “Are we not working them hard enough?”

“We ought to give them more detentions,” Harry said, “that’ll distract them.”

“I _have_ been thinking they’re overdue for a research paper,” Draco said musingly, “a really long dry one…”

And the matter was set aside – in conversation. Not, unfortunately, in Harry’s head. He couldn’t keep his thoughts from frothing like an over-stirred potion. 

_Would_ Draco be embarrassed to date him? Harry had felt lately as if Draco might, possibly, maybe be flirting, but suddenly he wondered if that was just ridiculous wish-fulfillment. Draco had been attentive lately, yes, and kind, and very watchful, and perhaps Harry had construed that as flirtation… but he’d somehow let himself forget that Draco was also a trained Healer. Of course he was watchful; to a Healer, Harry needed watching. 

Harry glanced over and found Draco watching him at that very moment. So was he flirting right now? Or was he waiting for Harry to topple over? 

He’d used to be so much better about intuiting these things. It did not help that most of his physical contact over the last year and a half had been with people trying to help him. He’d been touched a _lot_ , and far more regularly he ever had been before, but it wasn’t because people _wanted_ to touch him -- it was because he’d needed more hands-on care than he ever had in the past. There were the Healers at St. Mungo’s, of course, who’d had their hands on him night and day, poking, prodding, lifting, patting; and then when he’d stayed at Ron and Hermione’s for that month after he’d been released, his friends had constantly been helping him on and off the couch, helping him get dressed in the morning and undressed at night, letting him cling to them on the small, shuffling walks he’d used to take around the block. Even nowadays that he was as healed as he was ever going to be, he was forever taking peoples’ hands to get to his feet, or leaning on offered arms to get up stairs, or feeling people grab him if he stumbled.

He had been touched so much lately, yet somehow felt more physically lonely than he’d ever done in his life. It made no sense. 

Harry had noticed that Malfoy in particular had been touching him a fair amount – a hand on his shoulder or chest, a knee beneath the table – but like the watching, that could be explained by Malfoy’s Healer instincts. 

And had it really come to this? Could Harry no longer tell the difference between flirtation and professional concern? Next he’d be hitting on the poor girl at St. Mungo’s who’d taken his vitals each morning.

He and Malfoy had come to a patch of ground uneven with rocks and roots, and Harry slowed, careful with his steps lest he torque his knee or trip. He felt Malfoy move closer and he gritted his teeth, suddenly irritated by the concern. He wanted Malfoy to move closer because he wanted to _be_ closer, not because he thought Harry might do an accidental faceplant at any moment. 

And there it was: he wanted Malfoy to move closer. 

There was no avoiding it anymore, not even in the slippery confines of his own mind. 

He had an absolutely massive crush on Draco bloody Malfoy. 

Distantly, he’d known this for a while, but had avoided looking directly at it for many reasons -- most of which had much to do with the fact that this was Draco bloody Malfoy -- but also, Harry was coming to realize that he did not know how to have a crush as this new version of himself. He didn’t even know how to assess Malfoy’s interest, much less act on it. In his dating life he had relied heavily on the kinds of physical flirtation that led to one thing, and one thing only, and in point of fact he had absolutely no idea how to do that thing anymore. He trusted that he could learn, of course – could learn to navigate the limitations of his body in bed, just as he was learning to navigate them out of it – and thank god his mouth still worked just fine – but learning required a lot of patience from the partner upon whom one learned. Harry couldn’t expect anyone to stick around while he tried to figure out if he was good for anything but lying flat on his back, unmoving, wincing every now and then. 

“You’re quiet,” Draco said. “It’s unnerving.”

“Am I quiet? Just enjoying the scenery.”

The scenery at that moment was two squirrels avidly fucking. Rather on the nose, Harry thought, disgruntled. 

By the time they got to Hogsmeade, Harry was flagging badly and trying to pretend he wasn’t. His hip felt like someone had taken a hammer to it, and his arm was hanging so heavily on his bad shoulder that he’d unbuttoned part of his jacket so he could tuck his hand inside like a portrait of Napoleon and get some weight off it. He was very much looking forward to sitting down on one of Betsy’s excellent sofas. 

They passed Ron and Hermione’s street and Harry felt a pang of guilt for not getting in touch with his friends to tell them he was down, but as he’d said to the students, they were here strictly on business, not pleasure. 

When they entered her shop they found Betsy busy with a customer, a very small mustached man who was speaking excitedly about his idea for a self-sorting bookshelf, but she waved at them with great enthusiasm and pointed them towards the back room. Harry followed Draco to the little room they’d been in before, relieved to have a moment’s sit-down before anything else. He lowered himself down onto the couch and bit back a groan of relief at getting off his feet, then dug into his pocket for a pain potion and downed it quickly, not meeting Draco’s gaze. He didn’t want to answer questions about how he was feeling, he just wanted to feel better. Draco didn’t say anything, bless him, and for a minute or two Harry sat back, eyes closed, waiting for his body to stop shouting at him, listening to the distant murmur of Besty and her customer and the soft sound of Draco moving around the room as the pain ebbed away. 

When he opened his eyes again he saw that Draco had hopped up on the countertop, his legs swinging, feet thumping against the lower cabinets. His black jeans rode up and Harry saw he was wearing those bright orange socks again. 

“Is orange your favorite color?” he asked. 

“Yes, how did you --?” Draco glanced down at his ankles. “Oh. Yes. But I’m very particular, it’s only this exact shade. I can’t stand pumpkin, for example. What about you? Let me guess: green.”

Harry flushed, thinking of Jacob’s comments about his eyes. “No, actually. I wear it because Hermione’s always told me to, and I trust her more on these matters than myself -- but give me a cool, arctic blue any day.” Like Draco’s own eyes. “Like the lake right before it starts to freeze.”

“Poetic,” said Draco. He leaned to the side to pick up the kettle sitting by the coffeemaker. “I’m going to make some tea. Who knows how long Betsy will be out there chatting.”

In fact, she came in just a moment later, right as the kettle began whistling. 

“Good timing,” said Draco, as she kissed his cheek. “Tea?”

“Yes please but gimme the peppermint, if I have caffeine now I won’t sleep a wink. I barely slept last night, either, I was working on this rocking horse for my niece’s birthday, trying to enchant it to make a galloping noise but no matter what I did it just sounded like it was farting.”

“That could have its own comic appeal,” Draco said, handing Harry a mug of tea. 

“I love my brother too much to subject him to that,” said Betsy. She turned her beautiful eyes full on Harry, then, and said, “It’s lovely to see you again. How’s your wand?”

“Er – same as ever, no complaints.”

“Your cane’s out front, come see it!”

Draco took back the cup of tea so Harry could work himself reluctantly to his feet, and then, all three of them now clutching mugs, they traipsed back to the front of the shop and waited as Betsy ducked into a closet behind the front desk. 

The cane with which she emerged was, to Harry’s total delight, ordinary-looking in the extreme. It was just a very nice wooden cane with a flattish, downward-curving handle and a sensible rubber tip – not much different, in fact, than the one he had stowed away in his bedroom at Hogwarts, though this one was clearly made of nicer wood. When he looked closely he could see that the grain swirled and glowed beneath the unobtrusive matte finish.

“Here,” Betsy said, “walk it up and down the aisle before we actually put your wand in, so I can see if I need to make any alterations first. Really feel into the experience and think about how it’s working for you -- because no matter how nifty it is as a gadget, it’s trash if it doesn’t actually help you walk.”

Feeling awkward with both Betsy and Draco watching him, Harry took the cane on a trip around the store, leaning very lightly on it at first and then more heavily, testing its limits. It was extraordinarily comfortable to hold, and he realized she’d carved the wood to fit his own hand – which explained the plateful of goo, and made it seem very worthwhile. The support itself was also excellent: he felt steadier with the cane in his hand, more balanced and less fearful of falling, and the weight it took off his bad hip and knee was enough to make a marked difference in his pain. 

But he refused to get his hopes up. If the wand-function didn’t work, it wouldn’t matter how nice the cane itself was. 

“No alterations needed,” he said, coming back up around the aisle towards them. “It’s perfect, in this regard.”

“Draco?” Betsy said. 

“You don’t need quite such a white-knuckled grip, Potter, or your hand’ll get sore.”

Harry rolled his eyes good naturedly and loosened his grip. 

“Better,” Draco said. “And you’ll want to keep it perfectly in line with the ankle on your bad leg, don’t –”

“I didn’t mean give him physio tips,” said Betsy, thwapping Draco on the arm. “I just want to know if it’s the right size or if I need to lengthen it or what!”

“Oh,” said Draco, “yes, no, it looks excellent. Really nice work.”

“Now, for the good stuff,” said Betsy. “Here, gimme that for a sec. Okay so if you’re holding it like this –” she demonstrated, wrapping her beringed fingers around the handle “—then right here you’ll feel a little raised knot in the wood. Go on, try it. Feel it? That’s what you’ll be pressing to release your wand – and I haven’t set the enchantment yet, because I needed you here to activate it, we’ll do it in a minute, but anyway it’ll only pop out for you, okay? No one else’ll be able to get it out. It’ll take some practice before it feels totally natural but you strike me as pretty persistent so I bet you’ll have it down by the end of the week, and I swear it’ll actually be quicker in the long run than snatching it out of your pocket. I put a charm on the cane that’ll register intention, too, so if you accidentally press the knot you don’t have to worry about your wand popping out whenever you’re just like walking around the school or whatever. Got all that?”

“Yes,” said Harry, who’d been listening intently. He hadn’t expected the extra charmwork and he was both impressed with her skill and grateful for her foresight. She’d anticipated problems that hadn’t occurred to him. 

“Okay,” Betsy said, and grinned. “Now, give me that gorgeous wand of yours and let’s see how this goes.”

Harry, as hesitant as ever to part with his wand, handed it over slowly, though he relaxed to remember how carefully Betsy handled it, with such respect and professional attention. 

“Watch carefully,” she said. “Here’s how the wand goes in. See this little silver circle on the handle? You just –” she lowered the tip of his wand down and a moment later it had vanished into the wood. “Then, when you’re ready, it’s that little raised knot right here.” She pressed it, and the wand sprang out into her hand, while the cane stayed perfectly upright even though she wasn’t holding it any longer. “Oh, and there’s a stabilizing charm on it,” she said. “Figured it wouldn’t do you much good if it was clattering over every time you went for your wand.”

“You’ve thought of everything,” Harry said wonderingly. 

“Hardly, I haven’t solved, like, world hunger, but yeah, to tell you the truth, I’m pretty proud of this design. And I haven’t even told you the best part yet.”

“What could top this?” Harry said, already engrossed with repeatedly popping his wand in and out of the handle. 

“The cane’s made of holly wood,” she said. “And I called in a little favor and got a strand of unicorn hair, it’s not phoenix feather obviously but it’ll do the trick, which is, so long as your wand’s in there, the cane itself can function as a kind of extension of it. Definitely not for delicate spellwork, but for big blasty things – and for like a disarming charm, isn’t that what you’re known for? – you should be able to use the cane to conduct your magic.”

Harry was gaping. “No. Is that even possible?”

“Betsy,” said Draco. “You’re a bloody genius.”

Betsy’s eyes dilated huge and pleased. “Stop! It’s just a little trick from my old wandmaking days, you guys are embarrassing me, please, Draco, look somewhere else.”

“No, really though,” Harry said, popping his wand out again for the sheer pleasure of it. “This is absolutely brilliant. I never thought – I wouldn’t have imagined – I mean, thank you. Won’t you please let me pay you?”

“Yeah, haha, definitely not. But don’t think I’ll forget you promised to come visit when Mona’s back in town. I already owled her and said I had a surprise, so you can’t go back on your word!”

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Harry said. “I honestly – this is just –”

“Truly,” Betsy said. “It was my pleasure. And an honor.”

The bell over the front door jingled as someone else came in, and Betsy glanced to her new customer with a bright smile. “Be right with you!” She turned back to Harry. “We just need to activate the security charm so no one can get that wand out except you. Okay so I’m gonna tap this with my wand, then you have to press the knot and remove and insert your wand three times, so it gets to know you, got it?”

Harry got it. A moment later, the charm was in place, and any further attempts by Draco and Betsy to remove the wand proved fruitless. 

“Okay so yeah just enjoy it and let me know if there’s anything that needs tweaking or fixing and futzing!” Betsy kissed them both and gave Draco an extra-long squeeze. “Mona says hello,” she said. “You should owl her, she’s bored shitless out there in the North American rain.”

“I will,” Draco promised. “Give her my love, will you?”

The new customer, a young woman with a Holyhead Harpies t-shirt and lots of very glittery jewelry, was starting to look impatient, so Draco and Harry took their leave and went back out into the crisp fall evening. 

It was full dark, now, and Hogsmeade’s streets were bathed in warm yellow lamplight and window glow. Harry felt more confident on the cobblestones than he had done in some time, relying on the cane for balance and support instead of being forced to move at the pace of a snail to keep from tripping. 

“Thank you again,” Harry said. “For thinking of this in the first place, and for introducing me to Betsy.” Impulsively, he added, “You have to let me buy you dinner, as a token of my appreciation.”

Draco looked at him sideways. “Right now?”

“Well – why not? As you said earlier, we do have to eat. Is there – is there anywhere you particularly like?” Now that he’d proposed the idea, Harry was starting to get nervous. Walking around Hogsmeade together was one thing, but sitting alone at a restaurant? That felt like something else entirely. 

“Anything with a bit of spice to it,” Draco said. “Sometimes I think the Hogwarts house elves have never heard of pepper.”

They decided on an Indian restaurant a few blocks off the main square, a small place with colorful lights and a rather aggressive elephant theme. It was a Tuesday evening and so there were only a few other people there – all couples, Harry noticed nervously. The server sat them in the back and sent an elephant-shaped floating pitcher over with some water, while Harry popped the wand from the cane (would this ever get old?) so he could pocket it while he slid the cane itself beneath the table.

Draco seemed a bit stiff – and oh Merlin, somewhere along the line Harry had accidentally begun thinking of him as Draco again. He was clacking his thumb ring against his water glass, a nervous habit Harry had recently begun noticing, and was very intently scrutinizing the menu rather than try and make conversation. 

“So,” Harry said. “Er – how did you meet Betsy, anyway?”

Draco glanced up from the menu and to Harry’s surprise, he looked grim. “It’s not the most flattering story. Not flattering to me, anyway – Betsy comes off looking lovely as ever.”

“Oh, now you have to tell it.”

“Well.” Draco winced. “Merlin, this is embarrassing. Well, my first year at Hogwarts, I was – having rather a rough time – adjusting. I didn’t have friends, and the school was bringing back unpleasant memories. Plus, as you know, it was just a deadly amount of work that I wasn’t entirely prepared for. I was… depressed, I guess you could say.”

“That’s not embarrassing,” Harry said quietly. 

“I’m getting to the embarrassing part,” Draco said. “I’m just setting the emotional stage so you’ll understand what happens next.”

Harry smirked. “Go on.”

“Right. So, bad mood, feeling down, I snuck out to the Three Broomsticks to have a drink – just one drink, then right back to the castle.” Draco looked as if he were eating something unpleasant. “I did have one drink – but then I had another. And then another. And another. Perhaps you can see where this is going.” 

“You got blasted.”

“Yes, absolutely sozzled.” Draco was sitting very upright as he said this, the picture of a prim young gentleman.

“I’ve seen you put away a fair amount of liquor and barely show it,” Harry said. “I can’t imagine you…” he grinned at Draco’s phrase, “sozzled.”

“It’s a rare occurrence, for good reason. I get quite – high-spirited. There’s often singing involved.”

Harry immediate added getting Draco plastered to his bucket list. 

“On this particular occasion, I made a lot of people sing Centaur shanties with me, and then I – I think I got up on a table at some point – and was buying everyone drinks – and –” Draco put his head in his hand “—and I was sitting on a lot of laps, apparently, though I don’t recall most of this. There was a man there who was quite aggressively trying to take me home, and I was too drunk to properly object. All I remember is pushing someone away, someone with an awful, scratchy beard. Anyway, Betsy happened to be at the pub with her wife, Mona, you’ll like her a lot when you meet her… and bless them, they recognized a disaster when they saw one. They intervened, closed out my tab, and managed to get me back to their flat. They poured water down my throat and lay me out on their couch and next thing I knew I was waking up to the smell of coffee and the sound of Betsy talking a mile a minute.” He shrugged. “I ended up staying all day. Merlin knows why, but they took a shine to me and I to them.”

“Of course they liked you,” said Harry. “They made the mistake of thinking you were _fun_.”

The waiter was by their table suddenly, a quill and parchment hovering in the air next to him as he stood above them, hands politely behind his back. “Gentlemen? May I start you off with a beverage?”

“Ten strawberry daiquiris for this gentleman,” Harry said, grinning. 

It was decided that they would split a bottle of wine, and Harry tried not to read too much into this. But wine, that was date stuff, wasn’t it? If it wasn’t a date, they’d be drinking beer, wouldn’t they? Harry would, at any rate… but probably Draco always had wine, probably this didn’t mean anything, and if Harry had not fully admitted it to himself before, this panicked internal conversation would have convinced him: he _wanted_ this to be a date. 

He wanted to rumple Draco’s perfect hair and wrinkle Draco’s lovely shirt and bite his smooth white neck. He wanted to bruise those prim lips with kisses. He wanted to undo everything proper about Draco and turn him into an absolutely delicious mess, and then he wanted to clean him up again. 

“Harry?” Draco said, concerned. “Are you in pain?”

“No,” Harry said, trying to smooth out his expression. “Only hungry, all of a sudden.” He managed a smile. “Fancy an appetizer?”

It was, overall, an excellent meal. If it had been a date, Harry would have said it was a very, very good one, but because he wasn’t sure it was a date, it alternated between being great fun and being great agony. He kept second-guessing every tiny interaction – was Draco flirting, or was he like this with everyone? Was he smiling at Harry, or smiling at the delicious curry? Did he mean to bump his foot against Harry’s foot? When he helped Harry into his coat as they stood to leave, was he being gallant because he was courting Harry or because he was a Healer and Harry was a pathetic sod who could barely put on his own jacket?

“That was nice,” Draco said, holding the door for Harry. 

Was it nice because he’d enjoyed the company, or just because it was a change from the Great Hall? Was he holding the door because it was a date-like thing to do, or because he was worried Harry did actually need the door held? 

“Yeah,” Harry managed. Go on, you great coward, say something. “We should – we should do it again.”

Draco’s eyebrows went up, and he opened his mouth to respond, but –

“Harry James Potter!”

Draco and Harry both turned to find Ron Weasley standing on the corner of the road, dramatically lit beneath a wrought-iron streetlamp. His arms were folded and his hair was blazing like an avenging fire. 

“Ron,” Harry said, “what --?”

Ron strode towards them. “You came down to Hogsmeade without telling me?”

Hermione appeared around the corner, her eyes lighting up when she saw them. “Is that – oh, Harry, hi! Ron, what’s wrong?”

Ron pointed at Harry. “Did he tell you he was coming?”

Hermione furrowed her brow. “No. Why, should he have? Hello, Draco. You’re looking well.”

“Malfoy,” Ron sniffed. 

“Weasley,” Draco sniffed back. Then, to Hermione, in much nicer tones, “Hello, Minister. Congratulations on your recent Wizengamot win for mandatory house elf labor law.”

Hermione eyed him, clearly trying to suss out whether he was in earnest. 

“He means it,” Harry told her, leaning on his cane and grinning. 

“I mean it,” Draco agreed.

“Well – thank you.” She got a bit pink. “I’m very pleased. And oh, Harry, is that your new cane?”

Harry showed her and a slowly calming Ron the quick-release mechanism for his wand, and they stood around for a while oohing and aahing, until Harry saw Draco shivering out of the corner of his eye.

“We’ve got to be getting back to the castle,” Harry said. “Sorry I didn’t tell you I was here, Ron. We just popped down to get the cane, and –”

“—And go out to dinner, looks like,” Ron said, glaring at the bright sign of the restaurant they’d just exited. He narrowed his eyes at Harry. “Have a nice time, did you?”

“Lovely,” Draco answered for him. “Thank you, Weasley, for your concern.”

“Are you walking back?” Hermione asked anxiously. “At this hour?”

“No,” Harry said, “there ought to be a carriage waiting for us outside the Shrieking Shack.”

“Good,” she said, and patted both their arms. “Next time you two come down, we can all have dinner together!”

“Can we, now?” Ron said. 

“Shush. It was nice seeing you, Draco. Bye, Harry, love you.”

“Love you, ‘Mione,” Harry said. Then, teasingly, “And you, Won-Won.”

“Bugger off,” Ron muttered, and slunk after his wife, casting dark looks over his shoulder as the two of them vanished around the corner again. 

“I don’t think your friends like you hanging around with me,” said Draco as he and Harry started off in the opposite direction. He said it lightly, but there was an edge to his voice. 

“It’s only Ron, that man can hold a grudge like no one else. He’ll come round.”

“I can’t blame him,” Draco said quietly. “Sometimes I wish I could go back in time and push myself off a tower.”

“Don’t say that,” Harry said, with more ferocity than he’d intended. 

Draco glanced at him. They were nearing the Shrieking Shack, now; Harry could see the thestrals prancing restlessly in place, and he realized Draco would be able to see them, too. They’d both seen their fair share of death. 

“It’s odd,” Draco said. “To be on the right side of Harry Potter’s famous friendship.”

Harry felt a pang at this, both at the word “friendship” and at the way it made him feel to be spoken of in this manner, as if Harry Potter were a construction of himself but not him _self_. 

They were at the carriage and Draco climbed up first, then reached down to help haul Harry in and get him situated on the cushioned seat as the thestrals began their jouncing journey back to the castle. It was very dark in the small coach, and the quarters were close. Harry could smell the lingering anise and curry from their dinner, and beneath that, the unmistakable wood-and-amber of Draco’s skin. They were facing one another, knee-to-knee, legs barely touching. 

Say something, Harry urged him, and then turned the request upon himself: say something, Harry. 

But neither of them did. Instead, they rode back to the castle in silence. Together, apart, they stared out the windows into the velvet, star-streaked night.


	10. Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Just a short one! It's schooltime now and oy, what a time suck, but the next chapter will be much longer. And happier haha.

The new cane made getting around so much easier that Harry regretted every single day he’d gone without it. He had not, however, anticipated the enormous fuss that using the cane would engender.

“Professor!” gasped one of his first years as he came out of the Floo – first time without stumbling, thanks to the added support. “What’s happened to you?”

“Happened?” Harry said, confused. 

A different first year piped up. “Why’ve you got a stick with you?”

Harry followed their gaze and said, “Oh! No, nothing’s happened, it’s just – something to help me walk.” He looked at them incredulously. “Have you not noticed that I -- erm, limp a bit?”

“Obviously we _noticed_ ,” said another student. “But you didn’t need a stick before.”

Harry wasn’t sure how to answer that. “I don’t need it now, necessarily, either,” he said. “But it’s helpful to have. Like you don’t strictly need a fork to eat pasta, do you, but it’s certainly helpful.”

This was met with giggles and the subject was dropped. 

It came up again, however, in his next class – “Professor Potter! Are you all right?” – and again in the next, and then all the rest of the day. By dinner time Harry was so sick of it he had half a mind to stow the cane in a closet and never bring it back out. 

“Potter!” gasped McGonagall as he thumped up to the faculty table. “What’s happened to –”

“Nothing’s happened to me, I’m absolutely fine, just trying something new to help me get about,” Harry recited tersely, and sat as far away from her as he could. “Malfoy, pass the potatoes.”

“Had a lot of questions, have you?” Draco said, passing the potatoes across the table. He seemed amused by Harry’s surliness, which only made Harry surlier.

“Yes,” Harry snapped. “You’d think people have only just noticed that I’m – that I’m not the most mobile person in the first place. I guess seeing tangible evidence of it is somehow distressing.”

“I think your cane makes you look very smart,” Neville said. 

“Well, thanks,” Harry said, trying to put on a smile and failing. He was so sick of being so grumpy, but he couldn’t seem to help himself sometimes. It was a ruthless combination of being in pain and tired from being in pain – compounded by his hopeless attraction to the co-worker and former enemy who was right now buttering a piece of bread, totally innocent to the fact that even watching him do this stupid, simple, everyday task was making Harry feel like he was about to explode from frustrated desire.

“Did you – want this?” Draco said uncertainly.

Harry blinked. He hadn’t realized he’d been staring. “Fine. Yes.”

Draco passed the dish of butter and then the basket of bread, and Harry, still distracted, momentarily forgot that buttering bread was something he himself had not been able to do with any great success since he’d been injured. He picked up the bread in his good right hand and reached for the butter knife with his left, but managed only to knock it out of the dish. Then he tried to coax his left fingers to hold the bread while he wielded the knife with his right hand, but they hadn’t been taking orders from him well all day and he couldn’t manage to keep it steady. Finally, he put the bread on his plate and tried to weigh it down with his left fist so he could spread butter with his right, but he came down too heavily on the upturned edge of his plate and – like a slapstick nightmare – catapulted his entire dinner onto his lap.

“Fuck!” he roared.

“Shit!” said Draco. 

“Merlin!” said Neville.

“What’s happened down there?” called McGonagall. 

Harry couldn’t answer. He was suddenly so exhausted he couldn’t even find it in himself to lift his wand, and he sat there with a lapful of potatoes and chicken, trying to gather the energy to clean the mess and make a joke and get through the rest of the evening like a human being, but the energy wasn’t coming. 

“Is he quite all right?” he heard McGonagall ask.

“He’s fine,” Draco said, and Harry felt the gentle tap of Neville’s wand against his leg and a whispered, “Tergeo,” and a moment later his robes were perfectly clean.

“Thanks,” he said faintly. “Sorry, I – bit tired, I –”

“It’s all right,” Neville said, squeezing his good arm. 

“You are fine, aren’t you, Potter?” Draco said. 

Harry didn’t know how to answer that. He felt almost nothing except a deep, deep fatigue. Fatigue from the constant unreliability of his body, and fatigue from being looked at all the time, watched, scrutinized, questioned. 

“Bit tired,” he said again. “I think I – I think I’ll have to turn in early.”

“Eat something first, Harry,” Neville urged. 

Fatigue from being fretted-after, worried-over.

Draco was buttering another piece of bread, now, and handing it across the table. “Here.” 

Fatigue from being cosseted and mollycoddled. He did not want Draco to butter his bread. He wanted Draco to fuck him senseless into next week. 

Harry would have liked to have left the table right then and gone up into his own chambers where he could be frustrated and exhausted in peace – but leaving would cause a scene, and a scene would engender even more questions and staring and fussing, so he ate the bread quietly and managed enough dinner that Neville couldn’t complain and then, trying very hard to smile and seem perfectly normal, he pushed back from the table and said goodnight. 

He could see from Neville’s anxious face that he wasn’t putting on the best show, but sod it, he was so tired of performing day in and day out. Let Neville worry for an evening; it wouldn’t kill him. 

He kept his eyes forward as he made his way across the Great Hall to the Floo in the far corner, trying to project an air of unsociability so none of his students would accost him, and he felt a surge of relief when he got to the fireplace without being forced into a single conversation. The green flames flared up and he stepped in, preparing to state his destination.

“Wait!” said Draco. 

Harry turned to face him, feeling both desire and irritation licking at him like the Floo flames. “What?”

“I just wanted to check you were really all right,” Draco said. “You seem –”

“You don’t need to check on me,” Harry said, very sharply. “I’m not your patient, Draco – I’m your bloody colleague.”

Hurt, unmistakable, flickered across Draco’s face, and Harry felt a surge of impotent regret. That wasn’t what he really meant at all. What he meant was: I’m not your patient, I’m your friend. Or: I’m not your patient, I’m a grown man who _wants_ you. But anger was so familiar and easy – so much easier than any of the other feelings he might admit to.

“Right, sorry,” Draco said, face settling into a cold mask. “Merlin forbid the great Harry Potter admit he’s anything other than fine.”

“Don’t say my name like that,” Harry said furiously. 

“Like what?”

“Like -- like you know me.”

This, too, was not what he meant. He meant that “the great _Harry Potter_ ,” said in such tones, was not a real person – it was a myth, a celebrity. He, Harry, standing here in the flames, was real. He only wanted Draco to see that, to see _him_ , but he was too angry to explain this, and too frightened of what it would mean if he did.

“You’re right,” Draco said stiffly. “It was unprofessional of me to try and check on a colleague I hardly know.”

“And for the record, I’m _not_ fine,” Harry said, still riding that soothing wave of rage. “That’s bloody obvious to anyone who looks at me. Why you lot have to keep asking when you know the bloody answer…”

Draco clenched and unclenched his jaw visibly. “Because we care,” he said. “But don’t worry, I won’t keep making that mistake.”

They stared at each other, Harry still half-in the fireplace, Draco with his back to the Great Hall, and Harry could see heads swiveling, could see students trying to catch a glimpse of them, no doubt spreading ridiculous rumors amongst themselves, which only made Harry angrier. That’s all they’d ever be: rumors. 

Harry stepped back fully into the flames. “Harry Potter’s bedroom,” he said loudly, and Draco’s face – tight and expressionless – swirled into nothing. 

:::

Naturally, Harry regretted the argument as soon as he’d gotten a decent night’s sleep, but he did not know how to apologize. He felt that in order to make a real apology he’d have to explain what had gotten him so riled-up in the first place, which would mean explaining his feelings, which would mean admitting to Draco that he was falling for him. 

So he said nothing.

They were perfectly cordial to one another at mealtimes, but gone was the closeness and camaraderie that had been slowly, sweetly building. Perhaps Harry was imagining it, but Draco looked more tired than usual, circles beneath his eyes and his blond hair tousled instead of impeccably groomed, but he had forfeited the right to ask if Draco was okay. And Draco, for his part, did not inquire after Harry’s well-being, either. 

This was what Harry had asked for, of course. Yet it was not really what he wanted. He didn’t want Draco’s Healer concern; but he did want his concern. He wanted his attention and care, except he wanted it not as a medical case, but as a person. As a friend. As more than a friend. 

How could he explain all this without giving himself away? He couldn’t. 

Instead of actually spending time with or speaking to Draco, Harry threw himself into the mystery of who’d been sending Draco’s Howlers. Alone in his office, he pulled out everything he’d learned in his decade as an Auror, examining the envelope from every magical angle.

He unspooled the spell that had allowed the sender to dress the Howler up in a nonstandard envelope, and he broke it down into its parts (a concealment charm mixed with an amplification spell mixed with the original Howler formula). He tracked the envelope itself to a small Muggle stationary shop in Brighton and called in a favor from a former colleague, who went to the shop and then owled Harry a list of everyone who’d bought the envelopes, but none of them were even wizards. He called in another favor and got a list of every wizard living in Brighton and began to trace them for pureblood connections, but so far, zilch. He ran a fingerprints charm and found none; a charm that traced biological matter, and found none; and even tried an extremely difficult charm that traced the particulates breathed by the caster of the spell and told Harry what they had for lunch, which was apparently sardines on toast and a boiled egg, which really didn’t shed any light on anything other than how bad their breath must be. 

Harry knew what Draco would say about all this effort: he’d say it didn’t matter. That it was just Howlers, an annoyance, no harm done. But Harry knew how it must weigh on him to be screamed at every morning, another reminder of the past he’d tried so hard to overcome. It was beyond frustrating not to be able to find answers for him.

He did not quite let himself examine the reason he was working so hard at this. But the truth was, somewhere in the back of his mind he believed that if he managed to find answers, then he could go to Draco and tell him. It would be something to offer him; something Harry could give. It would be a way to apologize.


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for your patience, this update came slow but I hope you enjoy it!

“Harry,” Neville said, at the end of that week. “Have you and Draco had a row?”

They were walking along the grounds to the greenhouse so Harry could admire Neville’s new crop of Cute Snailwort, so-named, apparently, because they looked like very cute snails, which Harry was having trouble picturing. It was chilly and bright and smelled like turning leaves.

“A row?” Harry said airily. “Why do you ask that?”

Neville gave him a fond, exasperated look. “You forget I’ve known you twenty years,” he said. 

“Merlin, is that true? How’ve we gotten so old?”

“My point’s not that we’re old,” Neville said, “it’s that I can tell by now when you’ve had a fight with someone. And…” He glanced at Harry with an expression that, on anyone other than Neville Longbottom, might have been almost sly. “I can tell when you’re feeling other things, too.”

Harry absolutely refused to dignify that insinuation with a reaction. “We’re not _fighting_ ,” he said. “But we’ve maybe had a – a disagreement.” 

“What about?”

Harry didn’t know how to summarize it in a way that wouldn’t make him look like an idiot. “He was… hovering.”

“The other night, you mean? When you put your dinner all over yourself and then went vaguely catatonic and then tried to run away without talking to anyone?”

“Oh, sod off,” Harry said, with no heat. “That’s not how it was.”

Neville said, “He was just worried about you.”

“He’s a Healer,” Harry said. “Of course he was worried about me. Healers are problem-solvers and I’m a bloody problem.”

“You’re _not_ ,” Neville said, stopping so short that Harry nearly tripped over him. “That’s a terrible thing to say about yourself.”

“I only mean – you know.”

“I _don’t_ know,” Neville said stubbornly. 

Harry sighed. They were coming up to the greenhouse, now, and the ground was growing muddier beneath their feet from water runoff – muddier, and much slipperier, harder to manage even with the cane. 

“Here, hang onto me,” Neville said, taking the cane off him so he could grab Neville’s arm with his good hand. 

“Case in point,” said Harry, struggling up the short, muddy slope, Neville half-dragging him. “Problem.”

“This isn’t a problem,” Neville said. “It’s just a – a thing that is. And anyway, Draco’s not a Healer anymore.”

“I think he wishes he were,” Harry said. “He’s never told me why he left off but I get the sense he misses it, and I don’t want him taking his career regrets out on me, just because I happen to be close by. Thanks, I’m all right now.”

They were in the warm, damp greenhouse now, their shoes covered in mud, and Neville took a deep breath of the fragrant air and smiled. Then he frowned. 

“He hasn’t told you why he left?”

“No,” Harry said, leaning heavily on his cane to try and take pressure from his hip. “Why – he’s told you?”

“McGonagall told me,” Neville said. “He –"

“Hang on,” Harry said, “I want to hear this, sorry, but is there anywhere I could sit down?”

“Oh, yes – there’ll be chairs by the Cute Snailwort.”

He led Harry through several rows of thick, mysterious plants, some of them swaying in a nonexistent breeze, some of them covered in spikes, some of them curling and uncurling their leaves like coquettes as Harry and Neville passed. The Cute Snailwort was in a pot in the corner, and sure enough there were two lawn chairs set up in front of it, one of which was occupied by a seventh-year girl Harry only vaguely recognized. She leaped up when she saw the two of them approach. 

“Professor Longbottom!” she said, clearly thrilled to see him. “We’ve got a new baby, come and look!”

Neville rushed over to coo at what was, Harry learned, a fresh bud, and actually he had to admit it _was_ a very cute plant. Its buds looked like little cartoon snails with long, friendly antennae, and there was something irresistibly adorable about the cute little way it sat bunched up on the stem. If he wasn’t so excited about sitting down, Harry would have leaned over and given it a little hug. 

“What does it do?” Harry asked, trying to work himself into the low lawn chair. 

“It’s so cute it makes you want to kiss it,” Neville said happily, while his student nodded and beamed. “And then when you do kiss it, it explodes its seeds into your mouth, and then you spit them out, so you’re helping it propagate, it’s really quite a clever design!”

“But what if you swallow?” Harry said, and laughed delightedly at the look of absolute scandal Neville gave him. The student, thank Merlin, did not seem to get the joke. 

“It’s often used for love potions,” she said. “And it’s integral in the potion to find a good accountant.”

“Erm, Maria, could I ask you to take this clipping back to the castle?” Neville said, neatly shooing her away.

Harry stretched out his leg and resettled his bad arm in his lap, trying not to look directly at the deviously cute Cute Snailwort. “All right,” he said, “tell me why Malfoy quit Healing.”

“Well,” Neville said, fussing over the leaves like a proud mother, “like I said, I heard this from McGonagall, back when he was very first hired at Hogwarts. Like you, he didn’t even have to apply – she reached out and offered him the job, partly because they needed a new Potions master and he was very well-qualified… but partly to protect him.”

“Protect him? From what?”

“When he came back from France, he got a job at St. Mungo’s – but in his first week alone, three people tried to kill him.”

“What?” Harry said, genuinely startled. “Who? Why?”

Neville finally tore his eyes away from the Cute Snakewort and settled into the other lawn chair. “Two of them were plants. Not these kinds of plants, obviously – the bad kind, people pretending to be ill to gain admittance to St. Mungo’s so they could get at Draco. Old… friends of the family, I guess. Angry with him for his betrayal of their values.” 

“Merlin,” said Harry. “That’s awful.”

“But the other,” Neville said, “the other was an actual patient who’d spotted his Dark Mark and decided for a bit of vigilante justice. Leaped on him in broad daylight with a knife. She was – erm – a big fan of, of yours, I gather.”

“What do you mean?”

“She had—” Neville winced “—a tattoo of your face on her arm, and when she was pulled off him she said she’d been doing it for – for Harry Potter. McGonagall only told me that part this summer, when you were hired, because she was worried there’d be trouble between you and Draco.”

“She didn’t think _I_ ’d set that mad woman on him, did she?” Harry said, horrorstruck. 

“No, nothing like that, but – she did worry there’d be – grudges.” Neville chewed a thumbnail, eyeing Harry, then blurted, “So you see, you’re not the only one with a chip on your shoulder!”

“A chip?” Harry said indignantly. “What chip?”

“All this –” Neville flapped his hands “—this Healer nonsense about – about Draco only caring about you because you’re – whatever awful thing you said – a _problem_ to solve – and meanwhile Draco’s convinced you still think of him as a Death Eater and you’ve only tolerated his company this long because you’re bored and because he makes you potions and –”

“You talked to Draco about me?” Harry said, torn between anger and wanting to know every single word of every single thing Draco had said. 

“Yes, I have!” Neville said. “We’re friends too, you know, he had to talk to _some_ one and I was there, and – you’re both making each other miserable, it’s pointless! You shouldn’t be talking to me, you should be talking to one another, that’s why you’re fighting, really.”

“That isn’t why we’re fighting,” Harry said, “we’re fighting because –” he paused. “Because –” 

“Yes?”

He wilted. “Because I’m a prat.”

Neville had the tact to remain silent on this point, and for a while they just stared at the Cute Snailwort and thought their own separate thoughts. Harry _had_ been a prat; but he’d been a prat because he was – well, he was frightened. The way he felt about Draco… it did not feel casual. Couldn’t be casual, not with their history, not with the fact that they’d known each other twenty bloody years, and that was an intimidating thing to confront. 

It was made more intimidating by the fact that he, Harry, had recently undergone a rather serious life change, a change he hadn’t chosen for himself, a change he was still struggling with daily, a change that had rewritten huge parts of what he thought he knew about himself. Maybe that was why he bristled so when Draco called him “Harry Potter,” with all its connotations of power and heroism and able-bodied action. Ever since he’d gotten on the Hogwarts Express and sat next to Ron and realized that everybody knew who he was except for him, he had never quite felt like that image of “Harry Potter.” Now, even less so. Who even _was_ Harry Potter? 

And whoever he was, who could love him?

The answer that scared Harry, of course, was: no one. 

:::

It was almost the end of October, and the weather, which had been lovely and crisp, took a sudden dismal turn. It rained for an entire weekend straight, a cold, relentless rain that churned the grounds to pure mud and made the old stone castle feel damp and chilled no matter how many roaring fires one lit. Harry piled logs in the hearth and blankets on his bed but still he woke up wrecked, his hip and knee grinding like rusted hinges and his hand so stiff he couldn’t uncurl his fingers. His shoulder, which was usually the least of his worries, sent shooting pains through his back and neck every time he tried to move it, and pulling on his robes was sheer torture. He spent that whole miserable weekend alternating between hot baths and sitting in a chair pulled as close to the fire as he could manage without burning himself, trying to grade essays or work on his textbook but really just counting down the minutes until he could drink another potion. 

He couldn’t face the Great Hall so he had the house elves bring him his meals in his chambers, and because he was a pathetic, hypocritical fool, he wished he and Malfoy weren’t fighting so that Malfoy would come and check on him. There was something steadying about his presence, something grounding, and Harry could have used that solidity. When his pain was this bad it made him feel half-severed from the world, like he existed somehow outside of it, outside of everyone he knew, outside of even himself. 

Come Monday the rain had stopped and, thank Merlin, the pain had loosened its grip somewhat. He took a double-dose of potion to get through his classes and while his shoulder was still worse than usual, his fingers were a little more responsive and his leg held his weight well enough that he didn’t have to Lock it. 

Still, Betsy’s cane was just about the only thing keeping him up, and he was thankful for it as he limped out of the Floo and made his slow way towards his desk, wishing he were back in his bed with the covers pulled over his head instead of at the front of a classroom with thirty pairs of prepubescent eyes tracking him. 

“Hi all,” he said, forcing a smile as he lowered himself painstakingly down behind his desk. “Cold, isn’t it?”

Murmurs of agreement from his students. He aimed his wand at the fireplace he’d just vacated, intending to start a non-Floo fire, and flames roared up so loud and hot that half the class jumped. Harry winced. His control was shot this morning; most of his effort was going into simply not collapsing.

The classroom began to feel a bit warmer, however, and Harry got on with the lesson well enough. He wasn’t up for a lecture so he broke the students into groups and gave them a jinx worksheet with enough problems that they’d keep themselves more or less occupied with little to no input from him, and so the first period went by without much trouble. 

Second period, unfortunately, was not so easy. They were smack in the middle of a hands-on lesson about protective charms and Harry couldn’t change his lesson plan without substantially derailing everything, so he tucked his bad hand carefully in his pocket and grimly stood at the front of the class demonstrating charm after charm, and then dragged himself all around the classroom to watch different groups of students try them out. 

On a good day this would have been nothing, it would’ve been easy, but today was not a good day. 

Afterwards he sat at his desk, head in hand, trying to muster enough strength to make it through his next class; and then the next, and the next, and the next, Merlin help him. That extra dose of pain potion had mostly just made him sleepy, and when his thirds years filed into the classroom chatting and bouncing and jostling one another, he felt bitterly in awe of their young energy.

As they began settling in their seats, a owl swooped into the classroom and fluttered around before alighting on Harry’s desk, an envelope in its beak. 

“Oh, thanks,” Harry told it, and it hooted once before flapping away again. He lowered it into his lap and wedged it under his bad hand so he could tear open the flap, then read it quickly – and again, more slowly. 

_Hi Harry,_

_Hope this letter finds you well. Hard to believe it’s been almost two years since we were colleagues – we still miss you quite a bit here at the Auror’s office. I’m lucky to hear a lot about you from Hanna, who mentions how much she loves your class every time she owls home. She’s got aspirations to be an Auror now, thanks for that… and after I spent her whole childhood trying to deter her, too. I keep telling her it’s mostly paperwork but she won’t listen._

_Anyway, I’m glad you asked me to double-check Nimpkins’ findings on your friend’s Howler problem – because Nimpkins missed something (nothing’s changed round here, as you can see). Turns out the stationary shop where the envelope came from is owned by none other than a squib named Lizzie Debs. She’s been passing herself off as a Muggle for years, even married one. But before she was married she was known as Lizzie Goyle, youngest daughter of pureblood wizards. I guess her brother was an old classmate of yours – Gregory Goyle._

_Anyway, it’s a lead, isn’t it? Let me know if you need anything else. ME, not Nimpkins, he’s useless. (And keeps swiping my lunch.)_

_And if you’re ever in London, let me know. I’d love to get a pint and catch up._

_Negasi_

Harry slammed the letter down on the desk in satisfaction. The students sitting in the first row jumped, including Hanna, whom Harry beamed at. An excellent family, the Seids. This was clearly more than a lead: it was an answer. Draco’s old friend Gregory Goyle had been sending the Howlers all this time. 

Which meant Harry had something he could offer Draco; which meant they could finally make up. 

“You look happy, Professor Potter,” Jacob said, resting his chin on his hand and giving Harry a knowing sort of look. “Had a good weekend?”

“I had a shite weekend,” Harry said cheerfully. “But I’m hoping the week will be better. Now, if you could all line yourself up according to height…”

His good mood from the letter helped him push through third period to lunch, though the ache in his shoulder had intensified and his whole upper back was complaining. He hesitated at the Floo, debating whether to skip lunch in favor of a hot bath, but he was too eager to see Malfoy, to try and speak with him, to make things right, so he went to the Great Hall instead. 

But Malfoy, to his consternation, was not at lunch. 

“Harry,” Neville said as he came up to the faculty table. “Nice to see you up and about. How’re you feeling?”

“Better, thanks,” Harry said, scanning the room without sitting down. “Have you seen Malfoy today?”

“Yeah, at breakfast,” Neville said, “though don’t bother waiting, he’s out for the day.”

“Out?” Harry said blankly. 

“Minerva,” Neville called down the table. “Where’s Draco gone, again?”

McGonagall looked up from her bowl of soup. “He got a lead on a source for Finicky Rattler venom,” she said. “It’s rare enough that we both thought it best not to tarry, so he’s gone for the afternoon.”

“Oh,” Harry said, disappointed. Maybe he’d go take that hot bath after all. “You expect he’ll be back by dinner?”

“I expect he will not,” said McGonagall. “He went down to the village to take a Floo on the way there, but Finicky Rattler venom’s too finicky to travel by fireplace, so he’s coming back on his broom. Brighton’s at least a four hour flight, even with these good tailwinds, so in all likelihood he won’t be back until late.”

“Wait,” Harry said. A cold finger of fear ran across the back of his neck. “His source is in Brighton?” 

“Yes.”

“Who’s this source?” Harry barked. “Have they been vouched for by anyone we know? Did you see any authentication papers for the venom? Is he meeting anyone there or going alone?”

McGonagall and Neville were both gazing up at him in astonishment. “I don’t know,” McGonagall said. “But it can’t be terribly –”

“The person who’s been sending him Howlers – Howlers which essentially amount to death threats – has been sending them from Brighton,” Harry said.

Neville looked up at him anxiously. “It’s probably just a coincidence, Harry.”

“Not to sound exactly as paranoid as I am,” Harry said, “but there’s no such thing as coincidence. Not when it comes to bloody death threats. Fuck.”

McGonagall was rising from the table now, napkin dropping from her lap. When she spoke, her voice was calm, but Harry knew her well enough to see that she was worried. “Should we alert someone?”

“Yes,” Harry said. “I’ve still got friends in the Aurors’ office, I’ll owl at once and ask someone to meet me in Brighton.”

“You don’t mean to say _you’re_ going to Brighton?” McGonagall said. “Surely the Ministry can handle it without you.”

Harry turned to her, glaring. “I don’t trust them,” he said fiercely. “I can tell you the name Malfoy isn’t going to drum up much sympathy. It won’t be a priority.” He would’ve been guilty of that himself, two years ago. 

“There are still three class periods left today,” McGonagall protested, and then, seeing his face, added very hastily, “which I will cover for you myself.”

Neville was standing now, too, face serious. “Shall I come with you, Harry?”

“No,” Harry said, “we can’t have all our teachers running off, can we, Minerva?”

“Preferably not,” she sniffed. 

“You can come upstairs now, though,” Harry said to Neville, “and help me go through his office to see if we can find any evidence of where he’s meeting this so-called venom dealer.”

He already had a lead, thanks to Negasi, and planned to send an Auror or two to the Goyle's house, while he, Harry, tried to retrace Malfoy's steps in Brighton.

“How will we get in his office?” Neville said, wringing his hands. “It’ll be heavily warded.”

Harry smiled grimly. “That hasn’t stopped me before.”

McGonagall made a small moue of disapproval, but Harry was already halfway down the stairs, Neville hot on his heels. They crowded into the Floo together and went to the fifth floor, and Neville stood by as Harry took a deep breath, urging himself towards a patience he didn’t feel. He popped his wand out of his cane and stepped away from its magical upright rigidity, feeling out the wards carefully. Malfoy had changed and increased them since Harry’d first broken into his office, and Harry couldn’t help but feel small flicker of amusement through his worry as he pictured Malfoy’s frustrated indignance at how easy Harry still found it to break in. 

“Blimey,” Neville said as Harry opened the door a moment later. “You’re scary good at that, mate.”

“Yeah,” Harry said absently, wand clicking back in place as he gripped his cane again. He went straight to Malfoy’s desk and began rifling through the papers and parchments there, spreading them out clumsily with his bad hand, but he could tell instantly that they were all lesson plans and essays so he propped his cane against the wall and sat down in Malfoy’s chair to start going through the drawers. Nothing.

“Harry,” Neville called, “could you pop open this filing cabinet?”

Harry squinted across the room, trying to figure out if he could break the locks without getting back to his feet, but he couldn’t suss them out from this distance so he pushed himself up again and made his way to where Neville was standing. He’d forgotten, in his first rush of panic over Malfoy, that this was Not a Good Day, but, as a friendly reminder, his knee was starting to tremble a little beneath him. He transferred all his weight to his good leg so he could let go of his cane and crack the wards on the filing cabinet, then leaned against the wall as Neville began opening drawers. 

“What about this?” Neville said, holding open a file so Harry could see it. It was labeled “In Search Of” and appeared to be a list of rare supplies and what they might be used for. Sure enough, near the top of the list was “Finicky Rattler Venom: eyelash growth; teeth strengthening; resistance to sunburn; flexibility (HP?)”

Harry swallowed. This evidence that Malfoy had been thinking of him was almost too much to bear right now. “That doesn’t tell us much,” Harry said gruffly. “Keep looking. I’m going to try something else.”

He went back to Malfoy’s desk, eyeing the chair and deciding it would probably be best not to give into the urge to sit, so he set his balance and disengaged his wand from his cane yet again. He reached for the bottle of ink and the quill that sat at the corner of the desk and pulled them towards him. 

“Neville,” he called. “Could you give me a hand? Literally. Here, hold that quill up, right there. Yes, keep it very still, thanks. Don’t make any noises or sudden movements for a moment, all right?” 

Neville did as he was told. 

This was tricky magic and any interruption could ruin the spell. Harry pushed down the pain thudding through the left side of his body and put all of his focus into murmuring the spell with precisely the right inflection and moving his wand in precisely the right manner. From the quill he slowly and carefully teased out a long ribbon of words, written on the air in Malfoy’s distinctive looping cursive. If he could’ve crossed the fingers of his non-wand hand, he would have.

“What is that spell?” Neville whispered. 

“Last document this quill wrote,” Harry said, pushing glasses up his sweaty nose with the back of his wrist. The effort of difficult spellcasting while standing upright had taken a toll on him and his vision was blurring slightly. “Read it aloud for us, would you?”

Neville cleared his throat and did a fair approximation of Malfoy’s upper class drawl. “I won’t make it by ten – let’s say eleven? The Ragged Pony will do. Enclosed is the deposit you requested; I’ll pay the rest as soon as I’ve got the venom in hand. Thanks much. DM.”

“Yes,” Harry hissed in relief, dropping his wand and breaking the spell. “Excellent. We’ve got a time and a location, that’ll be enough to get started with.”

“It might not be as bad as you’re thinking,” Neville said. “It might just be he’s really gone to get some venom.”

“I hope so,” Harry said. “I don’t mind if everyone thinks I’m mad and paranoid, so long as Draco’s all right.”

Neville gave him a slightly misty look, and Harry, flushing, tried to distract him by adding, “I’m more like Mad-Eye every day, aren’t I? Paranoid, crippled, half-barmy…”

“Don’t speak ill of the dead,” Neville said, as Harry had known he would. “Nor of yourself. You’re none of those things.” Harry grinned and Neville said, “Well, you’re not half-barmy, anyway. You’re sure you don’t want me to come with you?”

“I want you here,” Harry said, because part of his half-barmy paranoia was the fear that maybe this whole thing was an even bigger ruse to lure Harry away from his students so someone could attack them; a scenario even Harry had to admit was unlikely, but still, he felt better knowing Neville would be around. “I’m going to owl an old colleague at the Ministry, then get a carriage to Hogsmeade to use Ron and Hermione’s Floo.”

“You’ve had a rough weekend,” Neville said, “will you be all right to –” He visibly stopped himself and changed tack. “Take some extra pain potion with you,” he said instead. 

“Good call,” Harry said. “I will, thanks.” He was grateful Neville had held back from fussing. “I feel all right for now,” he lied. 

“Keep me informed, if you can,” said Neville. 

“Definitely,” Harry promised. “Anyway, Malfoy and I will be back before you know it.”

He said it as confidently as possible, trying to reassure Neville as much as himself, and it worked on both of them. They smiled at one another, the same fearful, determined smiles they’d given each other hundreds of times, before countless battles both tiny and huge. 

“See you soon,” Neville said firmly.


	12. Chapter 12

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry again for the long delay! And for anyone worried that I'll abandon this story, I will not, I absolutely promise to finish it, just so you know. Only a couple chapters left now, I think...

Hermione was, of course, at work when Harry banged on their door, but Ron answered after a long moment, Rosie over his shoulder and a visibly sodden diaper in one hand. He looked harried and put-out but he blinked in surprise when he saw Harry and stepped back automatically to let him in. 

“What --?” Ron said. 

“I need to use your Floo,” Harry said. “Hi Rosie! Sorry, d’you mind?”

“No, come in, but – is everything all right?”

As briefly as possible, Harry filled Ron in while he finished changing Rosie’s diaper on the living room floor. Harry found himself pacing as he spoke, an old habit, and forced himself to stay still, conserve his energy, though he refused to sit when Ron repeatedly offered him a chair. 

“Thanks, no, I’ll never get back up,” Harry said. “Could I borrow a coat, though? I ran off without grabbing one and the cold’s making me go all stiff.”

Ron glanced at the curled, swollen fingers of his left hand, then at the white-knuckled grip the right had on his cane. “I don’t like this, mate.”

“Neither do I,” Harry snapped.

“Why’s it have to be you that goes? Hermione’s in a court session for another hour and a half, but I can Floo her when she’s done and she’ll send –”

“I’m not waiting an hour and half,” Harry said. “Malfoy could be – it could be too late by then. It might be too late now.”

Ron got the smug look he got when he was about to say something disagreeable. “Has it occurred to you that he might actually just be picking up some venom, perfectly safe?”

“Of course it has,” Harry said, trying to control his temper. “Look, I hope that at the end of today Malfoy’s perfectly safe and I look like a bloody great fool and everyone laughs at me. That’s the best-case scenario. But I have a – a _feeling_ \-- a gut instinct – and I can’t ignore it, even if it is paranoia.”

Ron chewed his lip for a moment. “All right,” he said finally, “I’ll get you a coat. Should I – do you want me to come? I could bring Rosie to George, or if he can’t watch her, I could try –”

“No,” Harry said, “but thanks, really, Ron. One of my old colleagues – you remember Negasi? – he’ll meet me there, and two others should be headed to Goyle’s family home right now. Maybe it’s overkill, but again, I’d rather be overprepared than under.”

“Merlin, your students were right,” Ron said, jiggling Rosie mechanically as she began to whimper. “You really do like him, don’t you?”

“I told you, he’s gotten much better,” Harry said, deliberately avoiding the question. 

“You’re blushing,” Ron said disgustedly. “I can’t believe I’m going to have to go on double dates with Draco bloody Malfoy.”

“Sod off and get me a coat,” Harry said, blushing harder, and Ron hurried to the hall closet. He came back a moment later with a very Muggle-looking pink fleece zip-up that Harry was relatively sure belonged to Hermione, which was probably for the better, as Ron was many sizes taller and larger than he was. Rosie, on Ron’s hip, was screaming now. 

“Shh, darling,” Ron cooed, “shut up, please, shhh.”

Harry grit his teeth and began carefully pulling the jacket up over his bad arm, wincing a little as his shoulder and back protested the movement. Ron seemed occupied with Rosie so Harry let himself stop halfway through and pull in a short breath before continuing, but Ron jerked his head up just as he did so and narrowed his eyes. 

“I don’t like this,” he said again. 

Harry ignored him, fumbling to get his jacket closed. He really had to find a zip-up spell. “Could I have a look at your network map so I can figure out where I’m headed?”

Ron put Rosie, shrieking, on a blanket on the floor, and came over to help Harry with the zipper. Then he dug the Floo map out of a drawer by the fireplace and handed it to Harry, peering over his shoulder. There were two public Floos in Brighton and Harry chose the one closest to the center of town, in a hidden room of an old hotel a few blocks from the marina. Once he arrived he’d ask someone where the Ragged Pony was and apparate there.

He hoped the owls he’d sent to the ministry were flying fast.

“Just in case,” he told Ron, “could I ask you to Floo the Aurors and pass along a message?”

He repeated the message he’d written to Negasi and Ron repeated it back to him, nodding, as Harry stepped forward into the green flames. They were blessedly warm against his aching joints and he savored it for one moment, before saying very loudly and clearly, “Brighton Public Floo Number One.”

“Be careful!” Ron shouted, and the flames swallowed him up. 

:::

The Floo spit him in out in an old-fashioned fireplace in a hotel room that looked like it hadn’t been used for a century, save for a clean path in the dust leading from the Floo to the door. There was furniture but it was all covered with sheets, and the window had been boarded up save for a tiny sliver at the top, so the light inside was murky and grey. Harry moved forward carefully, wary as always of unknown spaces, wondering how exactly he was supposed to get _out_ of the room – the door, too, was boarded up – but when he followed that footstepped path through the dust of the floor he found it led to a blank wall with a tiny, hand-lettered sign taped to the blank expanse: _tap three times_ , with a small black circle beneath the words. 

Harry tapped his wand against the circle, once, twice, three times, and the wall faded away to reveal a short, dark hallway. Harry fit his wand back into the cane and stepped through the passage, and the wall closed up again behind him, leaving him in total darkness. 

“Lumos,” he murmured, and Betsy’s excellent cane lit up like a torch. The passage was of brick, and it wasn’t far until he hit a door that opened into an alleyway. It was warmer here in Brighton than it had been in northern Scotland and was raining lightly, the sky bright white as if the sun were lurking just beyond the layer of clouds. The air smelled of brine, and Harry took a deep breath of it as he made his way onto the street to get his bearings. He felt a bit calmer now that he was here, taking action, though still he couldn’t fight the battery of images his treacherous brain kept supplying: Draco, tied up and bloody as he himself had once been; Draco, lifeless in a heap; Harry, too late to save him. 

There were plenty of people out on the main street despite the weather, and Harry flagged one down immediately – a stout woman in a pink coat – to ask after the Ragged Pony. 

“Oh, sure,” she said, adjusting her umbrella so it covered both of them, a gesture Harry found rather touching. “You’ll want to go just down to the end of the road here, then you’ll want to take a right, then you’ll want to continue for a bit until you see a sign for Cresswell street, then you’ll want to take another right, then you’ll see it at the end of the lane, big orange sign with a horse on it. You’ll want to go on in.”

“Thanks very much,” Harry said, and went back to the alley to apparate. It was harder if you’d never been to your destination, but he focused with as much determination as possible on the woman’s directions and on the idea of the men’s loo in the Ragged Pony, praying it would be single-stall.

It was not. He cracked out of nothing right next to a man at a urinal, and narrowly missed getting sprayed with piss when the terrified fellow swung around. Harry modified the poor man’s memory and suggested he leave the pub, then pushed open the washroom door and went out into a dingy, low-lit hallway. He took a moment to consciously try and relax, because his tension wasn’t doing his body any favors and his shoulder kept sending spasms of pain through his back. He rolled his neck carefully, shook out his right hand where it had a death-grip on his cane, and went into the pub. 

It was like any Muggle pub at one pm, all dark wood and hanging yellow glass lamps, televisions blaring the latest Muggle sportsball match for the two solitary customers drinking their pints at the bar, and the space was small and empty enough that Harry could see with a single sweep of his eyes that Draco was not here. At least not in the pub itself – there were no doubt plenty of back rooms. 

Negasi wasn’t here either, which meant he either hadn’t gotten Harry’s message yet or was busy with something else – though Harry felt certain he’d have sent someone in his place, if the latter were the case. Probably he would be here soon. Meanwhile Harry went to the bar and cleared his throat so the bartender, a heavyset young man in a sportsball t-shirt who was polishing a wine glass, turned around. 

“What’ll it be?” he said, putting down the glass and towel. 

Harry propped his cane against the bar so he could dig into the expandable pocket of his jeans, and took out the photo of Draco and his mother he’d swiped off Draco’s deck. He passed it to the bartender. “Looking for a mate of mine,” he said, leaning on his cane again. “You seen him?”

The bartender tilted his head, considering, then turned to one of the only other two people at the bar, a man with a thick blond mustache. “Oy, Phil,” he said. “This bloke look familiar?”

Phil turned out to be very tall and broad when he stood up and clomped over to look. “Hmm,” he said. “Oy, Craig. Take a look at this photo. You know this guy?”

Craig, who was also alarmingly broad though much less tall, shuffled up and took the photo, squinting at it with a pair of callow little eyes. Finally he said, “Yup.”

Startled, Harry started to say, “You do?”, and it was only years of training that had him reacting out of pure reflex when Craig, Phil and the bartender all reached for their pockets in tandem. He had his own wand out before any of them did (he really needed to find a way to repay Betsy) and was roaring “Expelliarmus!” just as the three wands came up to point at his face. 

Say what you wanted about Harry’s defensive tactics (plenty of people had), his expelliarmus was a brutal art by this point. Their wands flew out of their hands and across the room with such force that one of them splintered against the opposing wall, but Phil was already pulling back his fist for a blow, and Harry, knowing he’d be knocked down at the first threat to his balance, decided to get on the floor under his own steam. He threw himself at Phil before the punch could land, ramming him with his good shoulder and sending him crashing to the floor, aiming his wand as they both went down and shouting “Fragore!” at one of hanging lamps over Craig’s head.

He heard rather than saw the enormous crash of the lamp and of Craig’s body hitting the floor, because he was too busy trying not to get strangled by Phil, who’d thrown his meaty hands around Harry’s neck and was avidly squeezing. Harry, unable to get enough breath for a spell, jabbed him in the eye with his wand, and when he howled, grip faltering, Harry gasped “Stupefy!”

Phil slumped unconscious, and Harry rolled off him just as the bartender vaulted over the bar. “Stupefy!” Harry said again, and the barkeep froze mid-leap and collapsed – right on Harry’s bad leg. His vision went grey for a second, then re-racked. “Levicorpus,” he gritted out, and as soon as the bartender’s heavy body had lifted, he dragged himself out from under and let the man fall again. Craig, lying beneath the fallen lamp, seemed very much down for the count, but just in case, Harry aimed his wand and stupefied him as well. He didn’t trust a lamp to do a wand’s job. 

All this had taken roughly twelve seconds. 

Harry began the business of getting to his feet as quickly as possible, which was, in terms of difficulty, pretty much on par with knocking out three very large wizards. He put his wand between his teeth and reached out to grip the metal leg of a barstool – thank Merlin it was bolted in place – and managed to get himself up on his good knee, then readjusted his grip and pulled himself up inch by horrible inch. Effective, but deeply unpleasant, and he was panting audibly by the time he was standing. 

“Fuck,” he said to the empty bar. Then he turned to the three Stunned, unconscious wizards and, just to be on the safe side, Petrified them as well so they wouldn’t be able to move when they came to. 

Unfortunately, Harry could barely move either. His cane was still standing at magical attention by the bar, but he was far too keyed-up to imagine putting his wand away and so he reluctantly left the cane, and the much-needed support it would’ve offered, behind. Lurching like a man on the tail end of a bender, Harry dragged himself behind the bar to search for any evidence that might tell him what the fuck had just happened, and where the fuck Draco might be. He planned to question the wizards he’d just knocked out but long experience had taught him that the more information he had going in, the better the information he’d manage to get out of them. 

At least he knew now beyond a shadow of a doubt that his instincts had been right: Draco was in trouble. He would’ve much rather been wrong but at least he had confirmation that he was on the right track. Too worried and in too much pain to search carefully, Harry flicked his wand and sent all the cabinet doors flying open and all the liquor bottles flying out from the shelves, letting them hover briefly as he examined them and then sending them crashing to the floor when he was finished. The smell of booze was quickly overpowering and he saw nothing out of the ordinary; no hint of spellwork, nothing hidden anywhere. 

Harry was about to turn away when his eye caught on the framed liquor license posted above the fire extinguisher. He put a hand on the wall beside it to prop himself up and squinted at the text, searching for one detail in particular.

There: 

_Issued to The Ragged Pony, Owner Dougie Debs_

The name tugged at his memory, and he let go of the wall in order to stick his wand between his teeth and dig in the back pocket of his jeans. Negasi’s letter from that very morning was still there, and he shook it until it unfolded, then skimmed the text.

There it was. 

_Lizzie Debs,_ married name of the Squib formerly called Lizzie Goyle. Her Muggle husband must be – no, had to be – Dougie Debs, who owned this bar. As Harry had told Neville earlier, there was no such thing as a coincidence. 

Harry had most of his weight on his good right leg but still the bad one had begun trembling uncontrollably, and he shoved the letter back into his pocket so he could take his wand from his mouth and Lock his knee. His mind was racing through this new information. In the owl he’d sent to the Aurors he’d told them to go to the Goyle estate, where Malfoy’s old friend Gregory lived, but he wondered suddenly if he should have asked them to check out Lizzie’s house instead. He’d discounted her from any real mischief because she was a Squib who’d married a Muggle, and nothing seemed like a clearer denunciation of her family’s Pureblood ideals, but now he was not so sure. 

He moved out from behind the bar, his Locked leg dragging behind him like a slurred vowel and barely holding his weight even with the charm to keep it stiff. He was all-too-aware that it was only worry and sheer determination keeping him upright, and he gave up on searching the rest of the pub. He was just about to turn and start questioning the barkeep and his goons when he heard a clanking noise coming from the kitchen. 

He moved towards the door as quietly as he could, which wasn’t very, and then blasted it open, keeping his wand up as he cautiously advanced. He did not know what to expect – but he knew he was _not_ expecting to see Negasi Seid chained to a stove and making muffled grunts of panic through a Silencing charm.

“Shit,” Harry said, staggering over to him, trying to see if he was injured. He had a split lip but no other visible wounds and he widened his eyes up at Harry, clearly imploring him to remove the Silencing charm. It was a charm that could backfire horribly if improperly broken so Harry forced himself to pause and take a steadying breath, trying to focus in the midst of his clamoring mind: relief at seeing Negasi, worry for Draco, the pain of his body, he shoved it all down. He held his wand carefully to Negasi’s throat and said, “Sonorus!”

“Fucking hell!” Negasi gasped. “Am I glad to see you! Get me out of these chains!”

Harry was already busy doing so, tapping his wand against the metal until the links shattered, and a moment later Negasi was climbing to his feet.

“Are you all right?” Harry said urgently. 

“Fine,” Negasi said, vigorously shaking out his hands, “only my limbs are all asleep and they took my wand. I got here just about ten minutes before you, accidentally apparated right onto the bartop and got Stupefied by the barkeep before I knew what was happening. I heard your voice through the kitchen door and then a bloody great crashing sound and I thought you were done for, I nearly shat myself!”

“I Stupefied the three blokes out there,” Harry said, jerking his head over his bad shoulder and wincing as it sent a jolt of pain down his back. “We’ve got to question them quick and then get to Lizzie Debs’ house.”

“The Squib?”

“Yes. It’s her husband’s bar.”

Negasi, bless him, asked no further questions, only nodded and said, “Your lead.”

They went back out into the main pub and Harry said, “Secure the doors, would you? It wouldn’t do to have any Muggles popping in for a pint right now.”

Negasi hurried to seal the doors and came back as Harry was lifting the Petrification charm on the barkeep – or rather, partially lifting it, leaving only his head free. Immediately the man began thrashing it around so forcefully Harry worried he’d get whiplash, all the while shouting curses at the pair of them. 

“Look, mate,” Negasi said, crouching down next to him, “you’re already under arrest for attacking an Auror. Cooperating now’s probably your best bet to avoiding Azkaban. But if you don’t want to talk, I’m sure one of these other two will. Wonder what they’ll say about you.”

The barkeep stopped shouting and glared up mulishly instead. He looked ridiculous lying rigid on the floor with his head still wriggling this way and that, but Harry didn’t have much sense of humor at the moment and couldn’t appreciate the absurdity. 

“Are you employed by this pub?” Harry demanded. 

At first the man made no reply, but then, grudgingly, he shook his head. “No. ‘S a Muggle pub, I’m no Muggle.”

“You were called in just for today, then?”

The man said, “Yeah.”

“Did Lizzie Debs hire you?”

“Yeah.”

“The man whose picture you saw earlier, did he come in here?”

“Yeah.”

Harry aimed his wand between the man’s eyes. “I’m needing a bit more than _yeah_. What happened to him?”

“He came to meet Craig about some venom,” the man said. “Only there was no venom, there was only the three of us.” He grinned as if at a fond memory. “Put up a good fight for such a proper-looking fellow, but eventually Craig knocked him out the old-fashioned way and we got him tied up. Then come Lizzie and her husband to take him, I don’t know where. And before you ask, I don’t know why, either.”

That was all Harry needed at the moment. He looked down at Negasi. “We need to find out where the Debs live and get there, fast. There’ll be an address somewhere around here, on a checkbook or on a document, but I’m – I’m not quite up to searching, so if you --?”

“On it,” Negasi said, nodding as he rose from his crouch. “Can you send a Patronus to Nimpkins and tell him our plan? He’s with two others at the Goyle mansion. And sit down for a minute, Harry, would you? You look as if you’re about to fall over.”

Harry was, in fact, wavering badly on his feet, and he propped his good hip against a stool, not willing to sit completely for fear he’d be stuck. The Patronus, which usually came so naturally to him, was slow to appear and when it did, the normally solid-looking stag was flickering like an old film. He banished it impatiently and re-focused until he’d conjured another that was much more up to snuff, then hastily recorded a message to Nimpkins and sent it galloping away. 

“Wait,” the man on the floor said. “You’ve got to be fucking kidding me. Was that a fucking stag?”

Harry ignored him but the man let out a truly powerful groan. 

“Just my fucking luck,” he groaned. “ _Oh, it’ll be easy,_ says Lizzie. _Just knock out this prissy blond bloke,_ she says. _Play at being barkeep. Help yourself to a pint when you’re done._ Doesn’t mention that Harry fucking Potter might turn up wands blazing.”

Harry looked down at him, startled. “You recognized me by my… Patronus?”

“I go to trivia nights at the local,” the man said glumly. “Damn my luck, Mum’s going to murder me. I always manage to get myself hired by the baddies.”

“Er,” Harry said. “Professional tip, it’s mostly baddies who arrange, you know, attacks and kidnappings.”

“That’s what Mum said. Hey, d’you think I could have your autograph?”

“I don’t think so, no,” said Harry, and was saved from further awkwardness by Negasi’s reappearance, clattering down the side stairs. 

“Got the address,” he said breathlessly, waving a piece of paper in one hand and a wand in the other. “Found my wand, too, thank Merlin. They live a bit out of town, but plenty close enough to apparate.”

“Excellent,” Harry said, finally feeling secure enough to reach for his cane again and slot his wand away. “Could I side-along with you?”

“What’ll we do with this lot?” Negasi asked. 

“Yeah, what’ll you do with us?” asked the barkeep.

“Not really my concern at the moment,” Harry said. “But the doors’ll stay sealed the rest of the day and we can send a clean-up crew by nightfall.”

If everything went smoothly, he didn’t add, but Negasi shrugged and nodded. Then, preparing to apparate, he grabbed Harry roughly by his bad arm.

“Aah,” Harry said, one truncated syllable of pain escaping before he managed to bite it back. “Not – aah – not that arm, please.”

“Sorry, sorry,” Negasi said, practically wringing his hands. “I forgot, shit, sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Harry said, though his shoulder was pulsing agony through his neck. He put his bad hand safely away into his pocket where no one would be tempted to yank on it and offered Negasi the other arm, cane dangling from his hand. 

“Nice bit of work, that,” Negasi said, admiring it. “Okay, ready?”

Harry braced himself and a moment later they were whipped away into the darkness, then spat out again with a resounding crack. Harry barely kept his balance long enough to plant his cane on the ground and steady himself, and for a second it was all he could do to stay upright, faintly nauseous from the throb of his left side, gathering his resources for a day that wasn’t nearly finished. 

He fixed Draco’s face firmly in his mind: the sardonic eyebrows, those ice-blue eyes, the mouth that could be sneering or sweet. He had to be all right. If he wasn’t, Harry would tear the world apart. 

“All right?” Negasi said uncertainly. 

“Yeah,” Harry said. He took a long, slow breath and finally looked around at where they were. A drizzling grey sky, a rolling field of damp grass, clumps of trees, a dilapidated barn, and some ways away, a house. “Is that it, the Debs’ home?”

“Yes. Not that I’ve forgotten what it was like working under you, but I thought this once we’d make a game plan before storming in.”

“Good call,” Harry said. “I think my storming days may be over.”

Negasi snorted. “Could’ve fooled me. And fooled that barkeep, too.”

Harry very nearly smiled. “We could go with an old standby,” he said. “I go round the front, you go round the back? My sneaking days are _definitely_ over. I could distract at the front door and you could get in the house elsewhere?”

“What’s your distraction?” Negasi said. 

“I’m a poor stranded motorist,” Harry said. “My car’s broken down just over that hill.”

“You don’t think they’ll recognize you?”

“No,” Harry said, thinking of being recognized by Betsy for his wand, then by the barkeep for his Patronus. “Not at first, anyway. People haven’t been. They get distracted by other things. A limp is quite a good disguise, turns out.” 

Negasi was eyeing him critically. “Plus,” he said, “you look a right Muggle in that jacket.”

Harry looked down at himself. He’d forgotten he was wearing Hermione’s pink fleece, and he laughed. “It’s the Minister’s.”

“Of course it is.” Negasi hesitated. “But if they do recognize you?”

“Well,” Harry said slowly. “Then I guess I’ll have to storm in, won’t I?”

Negasi laughed. “Merlin, it’s good to work with you again.”

“Anyhow, when Nimpkins gets my Patronus, hopefully he’ll be on his way with backup,” Harry said. “Then you can do a proper Auror raid, none of this sneaking about with Hogwarts professors.”

“You’re still an Auror,” said Negasi, gripping his good shoulder. “Still the best we’ve ever had.”

Harry had already been dreading what he had to ask next, and this comment didn’t help matters. “I’m going to need help up to the road,” he said stiffly, eyeing the grassy embankment. “It’s too slippery for me to manage on my own. Do you mind? I’m sorry.”

“Not at all, what can I do?”

“Just let me hang onto your arm – yeah, like that. And tell me if I’m putting too much weight on you.” 

It was humiliating, letting Negasi see how difficult it was for him to climb such a short distance, but Harry tried very hard to ignore his own shame in favor of focusing on keeping his footing on the muddy ground. Negasi was solid at his side, easily holding them both steady when Harry slipped and nearly went down, and it didn’t take long for them to reach the firm flat expanse of the country road. Harry tried to step away, but Negasi held him for a moment longer, looking down at him, his normally cheerful brown eyes suddenly very intent. 

“I’m sorry we didn’t find you sooner,” Negasi said. 

Harry swallowed. “I’m sorry you had to find me at all,” he said. “I mean – I’m sorry you had to see that. What I did to those wizards.”

“I don’t care what you did to them,” Negasi said fiercely. “I hope there’s a hell so they can rot in it. I just keep thinking… if it had been one of us, and _you_ were the one looking, you would’ve found us before – before – you would’ve found us in time.”

“Stop,” Harry said, deeply uncomfortable. “Please. You _did_ find me in time. I would’ve died in that basement if you hadn’t. Whatever else happened, I can live with it, because I’m alive.”

Negasi blinked very rapidly and Harry was seized with the terrible thought that he might cry, but he didn’t, only pressed his lips together and nodded. “I’m really glad you are. And so’s Hanna.”

“Well, she won’t be glad if we don’t bring her potions professor back safe and sound,” Harry said, trying to steer them back on track.

“Right,” said Negasi. “I’ll go on round back now.”

“I’ll go as fast as I can,” Harry said, “but I’m slow and it’ll take me some time. Wait ‘til I’m at the front before you try anything.”

Negasi nodded, clapped Harry again on the shoulder, then turned to jog away through the muddy field, aiming for a clump of trees that would hide his approach from the back. Harry looked after him through rain-spattered glasses, then tightened his grip on his cane and began making his way towards the house. It hurt – everything hurt – but again he focused on Draco’s face and the pain didn’t feel so present. 

It would all be worth it – anything would be worth it – if he could find Draco and bring him home.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ye gods, apologies for the wait! I live in the US and I have done pretty much nothing for the past month except refresh the internet trying to make it promise me that Trump wouldn't win again, and GUESS WHAT! HE LOST! OH HAPPY DAY!!! What a fucking RELIEF y'all. Back to the things that really matter in life, like FAN FICTION. 
> 
> And THANK YOU SO MUCH for all your kudos and comments, I am absolutely thrilled you are enjoying the story, thanks a million to those of you who've taken the time to tell me. I am way behind on answering comments (see: election) but I'll try to catch up this next chapter. 
> 
> Hope this was worth the wait at least a little bit... enjoy...

By the time Harry made it down the muddy road to the Debs’ porch, his borrowed pink fleece jacket was the only thing standing between him and complete saturation. The rest of him – shoes, pants, glasses – were soaked with a light but fast-falling rain. The only bright spot was that his hair, which normally had a habit of standing somewhat upright, was heavy enough with water that it was easy to brush down across his forehead to hide his telltale scar. 

There were three steep steps up to the red front door, and Harry grit his teeth and did not let himself worry about how difficult he found the action of climbing them. If he worried about that, he’d have to worry about everything else: how his left shoulder had seized up so badly in the cold rain that he couldn’t fully turn his head, how his left hand was curled stiff and useless in his pocket, how every step he took was one step closer to discovering the limits of his body’s endurance. Instead he worried about Draco.

At the door, he knocked out a bright rhythm and arranged a sheepish smile on his face; he was a Muggle motorist, out of petrol, he was harmless, he was friendly, he was absolutely under no circumstances a famously hotheaded wizard come to destroy anyone who got between himself and Draco Malfoy. 

Still, he couldn’t help but tense as he heard footsteps approach on the other side of the door. Then came the click of a lock; then the slow turn of the doorknob. He gripped his cane, finger poised on the knob in the wood that would release his wand, and was ready for action when the door opened. 

On the other side stood a bearded blond man with an affable face and a benign, curious expression. “Hello there,” he said.

“Hi,” Harry said. _Helpless, Muggle, friendly._ “I’m frightfully sorry to bother you. But I’ve run out of petrol down over that hill and I was wondering if I could use your phone to have a mate come and get me.”

“Do you need a charger?”

Harry blinked. “A – charger?”

“For your phone. Is it dead?”

The morbidity of the question put him on edge until he remembered something. Muggles had portable phones these days, didn’t they? Quite useful-seeming, actually – none of this wondering if someone had gotten your Patronus or not. “Yes,” Harry said. “My phone. It’s… dead.”

“Well, hang tight, I can fetch you one. We’ve an outlet on the porch.”

“Look,” he said, “to tell you the truth, this weather’s doing a number on me.” He held up his cane, in case the man had missed it. “If there’s any chance I could just come in and get warm, maybe sit down…”

He put on his very best harmless Muggle face again and felt a flicker of hope when the man squinted at him, eyes sweeping from the cane to his pink jacket to his wet hair. 

“No can do, bub,” the man decided, and Harry’s heart plummeted. “But I’ll call you a cab if you need it.”

“Please,” Harry said, trying to look grateful. Fine. Whether or not Negasi had made it in yet, Harry was moving onto Plan B. The moment the man glanced down at his phone’s screen, Harry released his wand.

“Oh shit –” the man said, but not in time to duck the Petrificus Totalis spell Harry had sent flying. The man went rigid and toppled over backwards into the house with a mighty thud, eyes rolling in panic. Harry set his jaw and, feeling both determined and rather villainous, he stepped around the man’s body and into the house. 

It was warm inside, blessedly so, and he caught the faint, seductive scent of a wood fire; a smell that made his stiff joints cry out for heat. _Soon,_ he promised his body. _If you help me find Draco, I’ll give you a fireplace and a hot bath and a whole cauldron’s worth of pain potions._

He was in the foyer of a very Muggle-looking home, nothing magical anywhere that he could see. To the left appeared to be a kitchen, to the right a living room, and directly in front of him was a staircase leading to the second floor. He was standing very still, ears pricked for any sound, eyes skimming for any hint of where he ought to go first, when he heard the faint creak of a floorboard bending. He tensed, springing his wand again from his cane and shifting his weight to his good leg, prepared to strike. 

“It’s just me,” hissed Negasi, slipping out from the living room. “I popped in through a back window.” He noticed the man on the floor. “Blimey, you don’t waste time, do you?”

“He wouldn’t let me in,” Harry hissed back. “I did what I had to. Hang on – Muffliato!” He raised his voice to its normal volume. “You see anything?”

“Bunch of cars out back,” Negasi said. “More than you’d expect for one family.”

“You think there’s other people here?”

“Could be. Haven’t seen another soul, but I’ve only just come through.” Negasi held up his wand. “Corpus Localis, you think?”

Harry started to nod, then stopped, pain shooting through his shoulder and neck. “No better time for it.”

Negasi cast the spell quickly and skillfully, and a moment later a wisp of blue light shot from his wand and began to careen around the room, pausing briefly above both Harry and Negasi’s heads and then the head of the man knocked-out on the floor, taking on the vague shape of the number 3 before it shot away into the kitchen. 

The two men waited as the spell zipped around the house, searching out other humans, and though it only took three minutes it felt like an eternity. Anything might happen in three minutes; anything might happen to Draco while he, Harry, stood ineffectually in the foyer awaiting a little puff of blue fucking light. He leaned his good shoulder against a wall, trying to breathe through the thudding pain that threatened to split his body in two, then he glanced at Negasi. He wondered if this was how his Auror team had felt when they were searching for him – helpless, frightened, furious, determined. 

“Ah,” said Negasi, as his spell flew up through the floorboards and paused above his wand. He and Harry both gaped at it.

“ _Fifteen?_ ” Harry said. 

“Well, twelve,” said Negasi, motioning with his hand. “Aside from us three. But – twelve is still –”

“A lot of people.”

Negasi glanced around, clearly spooked. “Where _are_ they all?”

Harry’s patience was wearing thin. He wanted to find Draco and he wanted to sit down, in that order. “Maybe we should just start shouting so they show themselves.”

“That’s a tactic,” said Negasi. “But not a very good one.”

“Come on, then, let’s search the house,” Harry said, resigned, and pushed himself away from the wall, staggering briefly as he tried to get his leg working well enough to walk again.

“Shit,” Negasi said, putting out a hand to steady him. “You’ve looked better, Harry, I’ll be honest.”

“I’m all right,” Harry said immediately, but even to his ears the lie rang false. Despite his best efforts at denial he was beginning to accept the fact that he was working under a dual timeframe: not only was he desperate to find Draco before anything irrevocable happened, but he was struggling against the ticking clock of his own body, whose hour hand was nearing closer and closer to midnight. He could feel it trying to shut down and this enraged him as much as it scared him. After all they’d been through together, he and his body, this could not be the moment their teamwork dissolved. 

“Nimpkins and that lot should be here soon, anyhow,” Negasi said. “I bet they’ll –”

But Harry never found out what Negasi bet, because just then a voice split the air. 

“Dougie!” it called, imperious and female and muffled, far away, somewhere in the bowels of the house. “Dougie, what’s keeping you?”

“Get out,” Harry said to Negasi. “If someone’s going to find us they should only find one of us, go outside and wait for the aurors.”

“Absolutely not, are you –”

“Dougie?” The voice was closer now. 

Harry muttered a spell and flicked his wand and the front door snapped open, and with another flick he’d sent Dougie’s unconscious body sailing through it and onto the front porch. Negasi said, “Oh, come on,” and Harry said regretfully, “Sorry, mate,” then sent his friend flying after Dougie’s floating body as he broke the Muffliato and jammed his wand back into his cane. The front door closed just as a tall blond woman came out from the kitchen, wearing an irritated expression and full ceremonial witch’s robes in a lurid shade of turquoise. She stopped when she saw Harry but, to his surprise, did not look terribly alarmed. 

Harry cleared his throat, aiming for nonchalance. “Hi,” he said. 

“Hello,” she said, peering around him. “Was that you at the door, then?”

“Er – yes.”

“Where’s Dougie? We’re all waiting downstairs.”

Completely flummoxed by this turn of events, Harry said, “Dougie’s – he’s – gone outside to check something, a strange sound, he said. He’ll be back in soon.”

“Paranoid, that man,” said the woman, shaking her head. She gave Harry a sudden, warm smile. “Sorry, we haven’t even introduced ourselves. I’m Lizzie, of course; Evie’s mother. And you are – wait, no, don’t tell me. Are you Glen?”

“That’s right,” Harry said, returning her smile and hoping his internal panic wasn’t showing. “Glen. How’d you guess?”

“Dougie said you might come by. Couldn’t pass up the chance to see if the old magic really works, could you?”

“I couldn’t,” Harry said, wondering what on earth he was getting himself into. 

“Come along downstairs,” she said, then paused as he began to move towards her, seeming to see his cane for the first time. “What --?”

“Accident on the job,” Harry said quickly. “Sprained knee.”

“How on earth did you sprain your knee in a bank?” she said, leading him into the kitchen.

Harry grimaced. “I – er—I slipped. On a – a twenty pound note.”

“Well, Evie will be able to heal that soon enough!” Lizzie turned over her shoulder to beam at him. They were in the kitchen now, a big, bright affair with lots of stainless steel, and Lizzie was marching directly across it and putting her hand on a door in the far corner. A pantry, Harry thought for a moment, but she opened it to reveal a set of stairs and a whiff of damp air, and the truth became horribly clear. 

She was leading him into the basement. 

Panic bubbled up in his throat. The smell hit him like a curse -- damp cement, must, mildew, and for a moment he was flung back in time nearly two years, to another basement in another seemingly-normal home. He could feel the damp, dirty floor against his bare skin again, his arms and legs chained to the ground, alone except the leering faces that loomed above him every few hours and brought with them unimaginable pain. First his hand, the curse wrapping around his fingers, his palm, his wrist as he screamed; then his shoulder, his hip, his knee, as if his joints were being chewed up by a mouth of fire, teeth of acid, before they were spat back out -- dissolved, destroyed, aflame. The sound of laughter, the smell of rot. 

And now it was happening, what he’d been dreading all day: his body was giving up on him. All those ruined joints were turning sickly liquid like in his memories, his fingers flaring with pain, wrist spasming, shoulder hanging like dead, agonizing weight, his hip buckling, his knee –

But his knee, thank Merlin, was Locked. It was the only thing that kept him from pitching forward and falling down those dark stairs to his certain death. That, and the hand he’d flung out automatically to grab the doorframe, nearly dropping his cane. He tightened his grip, aghast at the thought of having come close to letting his wand go. 

“Are you all right?” Lizzie was halfway down the stairs but she stopped to peer back up at him. 

“Fine,” Harry called, surprised to hear how normal his voice sounded. He would have expected it to come out a croak. “Just the knee – you go on –”

She didn’t go on, though; she made it to the bottom and then turned around to watch as he made his slow, lurching way down. He tried to detach himself from the difficulty of the task, the pain of it and the knowledge that once he was down he’d be trapped, unable to get back up quickly enough to escape; but detachment only sent him spinning back into that horrible memory, so he tried to focus on the present; but the present was so deeply unpleasant that he gave up on that and focused instead on the future. Just let Draco be at the bottom of these steps and let him be all right, and Harry could handle anything else that happened. 

“Quite a sprain,” Lizzie ventured doubtfully when Harry had reached the bottom, visibly sweating. 

“Yeah,” he said. His threshold for chit-chat had been crossed. He let himself glance around and realized with some relief that this basement was a far cry from the one he’d been locked in. It smelled like a basement, yes, but it was carpeted and brightly-lit and there was a billiards table. Harry blinked at the table, confused.

“It’s just through here,” Lizzie said, gesturing to another door Harry hadn’t noticed. She glanced at her watch, frowning. “You get settled – I’m going to fetch Dougie. We have to start the ritual before sundown, he knows that.”

 _The ritual_? Oh, Harry did not like the sound of that. But he smiled and nodded and turned towards the door, hearing her footsteps retreating up the stairs. Stars, he hoped Negasi had hidden Dougie somewhere other than the front porch, or this would all go a lot quicker than he was ready for. He took a deep breath and went through the door. 

Draco was the first thing he saw. 

He was chained to a bolted-down metal chair in the middle of the room, shirtless, his lower lip split and his blond hair bloodied, one eye badly swollen, and it was unclear whether or not he was conscious. His head was slumped forward against his bare chest, hands fastened behind him, legs strapped down. He was alive, though; Harry could tell immediately, could see him breathing, and he was flooded with a relief so intense that for a moment he felt no pain. The sight of Draco was a pain potion in and of itself, the curve of his strong shoulders, the sweep of his hair, the sight of his orange socks peeking from beneath his trouser hem. Harry allowed himself one single moment to look, to bask in a wave of pure solace. 

Then he turned his attention to the rest of the room. 

It was a proper basement, cement walls, bare bulbs, but it was lit by hundreds of dripping candles, which the people crowded inside were trying to avoid. There were about a dozen of them, some in robes and some in casual Muggle garb, and Harry didn’t recognize anyone. They’d been chatting to one another when he’d come in, as if there wasn’t a half-naked beat-up man tied up in their midst, and they didn’t fully stop when Harry entered, though there was an ebb to the noise as they noticed him. They were all adults, he noticed, save for one person, a blond, spotty teenage girl in an extremely frothy white dress, who was standing near Draco’s chair and looking very nervous. 

“Hi,” he said to the person nearest him, a pretty dark-haired white woman in jeans and black cashmere, who was smiling at him in welcome. He tried not to look at Draco, though every instinct roared at him to act immediately, to knock out every one of these buggers and smash these chains and grab his friend and go. In practice he knew it would not be so simple. He smiled back down at the stranger. “I’m a bit late.”

“Oh no, you’re right on time,” she said. She extended a hand. “Abigail Selwyn.”

“Glen,” he said, awkwardly hooking his cane over his left arm so he could shake. Selwyn. That was a Pureblood family name, wasn’t it? He’d known Selwyns at Hogwarts; Slytherins, all.

“I haven’t seen you at any of our meetings,” Abigail said. 

“Well,” said Harry, “you know…”

She narrowed her eyes at him, suddenly suspicious, and his heart lurched. “You are a Squib, aren’t you?” she demanded. “Not a Muggle?”

“A Muggle!” Harry said, laughing, brain working overtime to process what she was saying. A Squib? Were all of these people Squibs, then? “Merlin, no. Squib all the way through.”

Abigail relaxed and went back to smiling at him. “Oh good. Lizzie did promise Dougie would be the only Muggle, and he’s practically one of us, by this point.”

“Just so,” said Harry, and dared a leading comment. “Anyway, this is tremendously exciting. If the ritual works…” He shrugged his shoulder – the good one, but even that sent spasms of pain down his back, and he worked to keep the wince from his face. 

“I know,” Abigail said, leaning closer. “We’ll make history.” She touched his arm and he realized with a jolt that she was _flirting_ with him. It seemed patently mad that anyone would want to flirt with him when he felt so bloody terrible, but apparently his outsides were doing a good job concealing the wreck of his insides. How could she look past this pink fleece, though? Mystery upon mystery.

Another man had joined them, very tall and pale in dark robes. “To be frank,” he said, “I’m still a bit bewildered that we’re bestowing such a gift upon a _teenager._ ”

“Lizzie’s the one who found the ritual,” Abigail pointed out. “ _And_ the pureblood traitor. Stands to reason she'd want her daughter to get his magic.”

“Besides,” said a different robed man, bouncing excitedly on his toes. “Once we prove this works, Azkaban is full of purebloods. They’re as good as dead, anyhow – I’m certain we can convince the Ministry to sacrifice them for the greater good of our wizarding lines. No one wants to have a Squib child anymore than we wanted to be born one!”

“We’ll not get anywhere with that mudblood Granger in charge,” huffed the tall pale man. “No, if we want something done, we’ll have to do it alone. My eye’s on Narcissa, for myself.”

“I’ve been keeping track of the Zabini boy,” said Abigail. “He’s a traitor just like Malfoy.”

Harry could not help but glance towards the Malfoy in question, and his heart leaped when he saw that Draco had dragged his head up and was staring at him. His expression, usually so controlled, broke open for a moment, and Harry saw all the things he himself was feeling: fear, relief, concern, desperation, connection. Then Draco’s face went blank again and his head slumped back down. 

Harry forced himself to look away, his heart still beating hard, his jaw tight. A picture was coming together in his mind and it was not a pleasant one. He took a deep breath and a big risk. “What’s the first spell you’d cast?” he asked Abigail. “If you got magic?”

“Lumos,” she said immediately. “I remember my sister coming home from Hogwarts and lighting up our bedroom late at night, and I was so jealous I could barely think.”

Harry thought he understood, now, what this ritual was intended to do. They were going to kill Malfoy -- and somehow, through Merlin knew what kind of arcane dark ritual, they thought they could take his magic and channel it into that teenage girl. Evie, in the white dress, looking lost and anxious. 

Well, this was very good news on one front: all of these murderous psychos were Squibs, which meant Harry was the only one in the room with magic. Good odds, those. 

But even as he thought this, he realized that Muggles and Squibs couldn’t cast rituals. Which meant there had to be another wizard present, after all.

“Who’s this?” someone said, and Harry looked up into the broad face of Gregory Goyle. 

“This is Glen,” Abigail said, squeezing his bad arm, and Harry schooled his face, wildly thinking that maybe Gregory wouldn’t recognize him, maybe he wouldn’t be able to see past the scars and the cane and the days-old beard, though he had of course recognized Gregory right away, despite the many intervening years, the new wrinkles, the new pounds. But even as he met his old classmate’s eyes he knew it was hopeless. It was a minor miracle, in fact, that none of these Squibs had recognized him yet. 

“It is not,” Gregory growled, “It’s –” and okay, Harry had seen enough to call this. His wand was out and he was shouting “Expelliarmus!” before Gregory had finished saying “—Harry Potter,” but Gregory’s wand was drawn and he was shouting a spell, too, and jets of light leaped out at the same time. Harry’s spell found its mark first, knocking Gregory’s wand from his hand, and he had a moment of hope before Gregory’s spell hit. It knocked him across the room, his back slamming against the wall, candles guttering in his wake, and only the small size of the room saved him from a concussion as his head thwacked concrete. He’d only been forced back about five feet, not enough momentum to do any real damage, but Harry was damaged already and the pain was so great that black began to creep into the edges of his vision. He was still holding his wand, though, and he had managed to keep his feet under him, and that was all that mattered.

“Grab him,” he heard Gregory shout, and hands reached out towards him. Someone grabbed his bad arm and twisted it behind his back and he couldn’t help but shout, his good leg buckling, but his bad knee was still Locked rigid and he used it to keep himself upright as he aimed at Gregory and knocked him out just as he’d picked up his wand again. Gregory hit the floor hard and a woman screamed. 

And now it was just Harry and a pack of magicless Squibs, and it should’ve been an easy job, breaking free and getting to Malfoy, but the grip on his bad arm wrenched it even further, his shoulder screaming, his whole back seizing up, and he was in so much pain he was breathless with it, unable to get enough air to form the words for a spell. He pointed his wand at whoever was holding his arm – Abigail, it was Abigail -- and let out a nonverbal gust of magic that shoved her back and away, but though the pressure loosened the pain didn’t, and it was happening, the thing he’d feared most, his body was betraying him. His vision was swimming and every bone and muscle and joint was working in tandem to get his brain to shut down, to plunge him into blessed unconsciousness where nothing would hurt. Desperately, he pointed his wand at Malfoy’s chains just as people came at him from both sides, ramming into his bad arm, kicking his bad leg, grabbing hold of his good wand arm and pulling it down as the spell broke free, shot across the room – and missed. 

Harry saw the chain-breaking charm hit the wall just behind Malfoy’s chair, useless, just as two men finally managed to bear him to the ground. Someone stamped very hard on his good hand and a second later, they’d taken his wand. 

“Tie him up!” someone shrieked, and Harry, clinging to consciousness by the skin of his teeth, was dragged into a sitting position, where he felt his wrists being bound behind him, then his ankles tied together. He tried to struggle, but every movement brought a fresh wave of agony and a bigger threat of passing out, so eventually he went limp. 

“Is that really Harry Potter?” someone asked. “I thought he’d be taller.”

Somebody kicked his bad hip. “Who the fuck told you we’d be here?” a gruff male voice demanded, but Harry couldn’t speak. He was panting, trying with every gasp to cling to consciousness. He could see Malfoy through the filmy haze of his vision, struggling wildly against the chains, all pretense at docility abandoned, and where the fuck was Negasi? Where was Nimpkins? Where were the Aurors? Here he was, in agony in another fucking basement, waiting for help that wouldn’t arrive, only this time it was worse because Draco was here too, and Harry hadn’t saved him. He could see his face, bloodied and bruised but still so handsome, his mouth forming Harry’s name as someone kicked him in the hip again, and even beneath the pain Harry felt his rage growing. 

Fuck these people. Fuck Negasi, fuck Nimpkins, fuck everybody except Draco, who Harry would never even have a fucking chance to fuck for real because they were both going to die here, beaten by Squibs because Harry’s fucking body couldn’t handle its shit. _Fuck_ his body. Fuck the men who’d done this to him in the first place. Fuck basements in general!

His rage swelled in him, hot and roaring and nearly tangible, a boiling wind, and he knew this feeling. He’d felt it before, in another fucking basement, almost two years ago when he’d thought he was going to die and he’d exploded not only his chains but several heads. He hadn’t known what to do with this feeling then; it had exploded out of him on a wave of pure instinct; but he thought he might know now. He fought down the pain, fought down the rage, fought everything except that hot wind, and he used the last of his focus to stare at Draco’s chains, and he _pushed_.

A lot of things happened at once. 

All the candles went out, Draco’s chains exploded, the metal chair exploded, Draco leaped to his feet, the door exploded from the other side, and Negasi shouted, “Harry!” as a surge of Aurors poured into the room. 

“About fucking time,” Harry muttered, and finally, finally, finally, let himself sink into nothingness.


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think this'll be about 2-3 more chapters, just FYI... thank you so much for reading!

The ceiling was pink. 

That was the first thing Harry noticed when he opened his eyes: pink ceiling. 

The second thing he noticed was that absolutely every part of him hurt. 

Further observations were slow to come because he was too occupied with trying to pass out again, hoping to step right back into oblivion so he wouldn’t have to face the shrill screaming of his indignant body, but it was a no-go. He was conscious, and getting more conscious by the moment, unfortunately. 

A familiar face swam into view above him. Dark skin, furrowed brow, a pair of big, shining, concerned eyes. “Are you awake?” Negasi said anxiously, then shouted, “He’s awake!”

Harry groaned, trying to get his bearings. He was lying down on something soft; a couch. He was in a living room and the ceiling was not the only thing that was pink. Curtains, armchairs, rug, wallpaper: pink. It was like being in an enormous vagina. Negasi was kneeling at his side, and there were other people, too, but their faces were too blurry for Harry to make out. “Glasses,” he slurred. Then, more distinctly as memory came rushing back, “Draco! Is Draco all right?”

“He’s fine,” Negasi said, “he’s – Harry, stop, lie down! Oh, bugger, someone go get – stop moving, damn it!”

Harry was struggling to sit up against the arm of the couch but finding it shockingly hard. The left half of his body was a useless, agonizing throb. Someone had folded his bad arm across his stomach and it fell into his lap as he moved, entirely ignoring any requests he made of it; he couldn’t even twitch his fingers. He managed to get himself propped up on one elbow but try as he might he couldn’t manage to make it further than that. Negasi had a hand on his chest, trying to keep him down, though it was clear he was nervous to press too hard or be too rough and it was mostly ineffectual.

“Please,” he was babbling, “Harry, they told me you had to stay still, please stop making this so difficult –”

“Don’t worry,” said a low voice. “If he’s making things difficult it means he’s feeling like himself.”

It was a voice Harry had once thought snide but now found full of quiet humor; a voice that poured through his body like a tonic.

“Draco,” he said, going limp with relief. He blinked at the blond blur over Negasi’s shoulder, and a moment later, Draco bent his face into view. It was the best thing Harry had ever seen – split lip, black eye and all. “Merlin, I’m glad you’re all right.”

Very gently, Draco set Harry’s glasses on his face, fingers barely brushing Harry’s cheeks. The rest of the pink room crystallized. “I’m fine,” Draco said. “Alive, thanks to you.”

“Where’s my wand?”

“Calm down, it’s right here in your cane.”

“Are we – are we still in the Debs’ house? What happened?”

“Lots of arrests, is what,” said Negasi. “Sorry it took so long for us to come find you, Harry – Nimpkins busted into the wrong house at first, the idiot, had to memory-wipe an entire family of Muggles. Anyway, we’re waiting for the Healers. You both got conked on the head and we didn’t think it wise to apparate either of you just yet.”

“Your head,” Harry said worriedly, eyes going to the blood in Draco’s hair, “are you –”

“I’m not the one who can’t sit up under his own steam,” Draco pointed out, pulling a chair up to the side of the couch and sinking into it gracefully. There was something strange about his appearance and it took Harry a moment to realize that someone had put him in an oversized hooded sportsball sweatshirt, so different from his usual carefully-chosen clothing that Harry couldn’t help but smile. 

“Nice sweatshirt.”

“And nice – what would one even call that monstrosity you’re wearing?” Draco plucked at Harry’s pink sleeve. 

“A fleece,” said Harry.

“Ah. Of course.” He let go of the material but kept his fingertips on Harry’s arm, his touch light. 

It was so good to see Draco that Harry had managed to forget how very not-good everything else felt, and he tried again to sit upright but stopped, grunting a little in pain. He fell back against the cushions, fighting a wave of panic.

“Why –” He swallowed. “Why is it so hard to move?”

“Because you have quite aggressively overworked a set of very curse-damaged joints that ought not have been worked at all,” Draco said. “You need heat, massage, pain potion, and probably a week in bed; but you’ll be all right.”

It was his Healer’s voice, and Harry felt himself bristling out of instinct. But then, remembering their fight, their weeks without speaking because of his own stupid pride, he deflated. 

“Your shoulder in particular will probably need to be immobilized for a while,” Draco said, and put a palm over the joint in question. His touch was careful, wary of causing more pain, but Harry thought he could feel the warmth of it even through the fleece. “And your wrist.” Gently, he smoothed his hand down Harry’s arm and wrapped his beautiful fingers briefly around Harry’s aching wrist. “Your fingers too, I’m afraid,” he added, and cradled Harry’s scarred hand in his own. 

He did not let go. 

Harry’s heart was suddenly pounding and his head swam with something that felt like the exact opposite of pain. 

“Er, right,” said Negasi, standing. “I’m going to – are you thirsty, Harry? I’ll get you a glass of water. Draco? Water? Yes. I’ll – I’ll go and do that.”

Harry barely heard him. All of his focus was on his hand sitting in Draco’s. 

Idly, Draco moved his thumb across Harry’s palm. “I suppose I was overdue for another appearance on the list,” he said. 

“The list?” Harry said, a little breathless. 

“Of people rescued by the great Harry Potter.”

A sliver of ice lodged itself in Harry’s chest. “Please don’t call me that.”

Draco’s thumb stopped moving. “Why do you get upset when I say your name?”

“It’s not my name that bothers me, it’s – when you say it like that. _The great Harry Potter._ I’m not – that isn’t me, I’m not Harry Potter.” Harry winced at Draco’s dubious expression and started again. “I mean, I am, obviously, I didn’t hit my head that hard, but I’m not – I didn’t come after you because I’m _Harry Potter_. I came after you because – well, because – because –” 

Frustrated, Harry fell silent. Years of coaching from Hermione and still he could never find the right words to talk about his feelings. What _was_ he trying to say? Draco was looking at him, waiting. 

“I’m not a myth,” Harry said. “I’m a person. And I want you…" He tried to be honest. "I want you, of all people, to see that person.”

Draco’s thumb began moving again across Harry’s palm, a little firmer this time, though it took him a moment to respond. When he did, he said, “I understand.”

“Yeah?”

“When you put it like that… well, I’m not Draco Malfoy, either. Not really.”

Harry said, “It took me a while to realize that.”

“Ditto,” said Draco drily, and Harry laughed. They sat quietly for a moment and then Draco said, “Look, today was… Not nice. I admit I was – well, I was a bit worried I might be…”

“Murdered in a basement by a bunch of Squibs?”

“Right, that.” Draco nearly smiled. “I was… there were times I was frightened. But I kept calm, for the most part, because I hoped – not just hoped, but really believed – that you’d come for me. Not because you’re Harry Potter, but because you’re you.” He cleared his throat. “So what I meant to say, what I _should_ have said, is thank you. For being you.” A ghost of a smirk. “Whoever that is.”

Harry swallowed hard. Then, steeling himself against a rush of nerves, he said, “I’ll always come for you, Draco.”

A flush rose in Draco’s face, pink as the room around him but far more lovely. He ducked his head, tonguing his split lip absentmindedly; a gesture that made Harry’s stomach do a strange flip-flop. He kept his eyes on Harry’s hand, where his thumb was now pressing gently on a particularly tender spot at the base of his pinky. The muscle was drawn tight, keeping the finger curled inwards, and Draco slowly stroked it, warming it up, loosening it. 

Harry frowned suddenly. “Are you holding my hand, or massaging it?” he said.

“Er,” Draco said. “A bit of both?”

Harry’s frown deepened into a scowl. 

“Oh, what now?” Draco said, but Harry could see that not-a-smile smile playing around his lips. “Are you going to accuse me again of playing Healer?”

Harry, who had been about to do exactly that, faltered. 

“You’re impossible, you know that?” said Draco. “I’m holding your hand because – well, because I want to touch you, because I _like_ you; and I’m massaging it because I’m a trained Healer and I can feel how absolutely buggered your muscles are right now. Can’t I do both things at once?”

“You like me?” Harry blurted out. “I mean, you -- _like_ me?”

“Are you twelve?” said Draco. “No, don’t answer that, I knew you at twelve. Yes, of course I _like_ you. I’ve only been bloody obvious about it for months.”

“You have not,” said Harry, beginning to grin. “You’ve been infuriatingly subtle.”

“How’s this for subtle,” Draco said, and let go of Harry’s hand. Harry mourned the lack of contact for exactly two seconds – until Draco leaned forward, and forward, and forward, until his snowmelt blue eyes were mere inches from Harry’s own, no less beautiful for the bruise swollen thick around one of them. He reached up and trailed the backs of his fingers down Harry’s jaw, then, very slowly, he swiped the pad of his thumb across Harry’s bottom lip. Harry shivered. There was dried blood in Draco’s hair, on his cheek, on his mouth, but Harry didn’t care. He smelled of amber and woodsmoke and he was so close now that Harry could feel his breath ghosting across Harry’s own lips as he spoke. 

“To be clear,” Draco murmured. “The feeling is mutual, yes?”

“Yes,” Harry said, airless with want. “Very.”

“I’m not being too subtle?”

“Merlin, Draco,” Harry groaned. “Would you kiss me already?”

“Bossy,” Draco said, but he did as he was told. Finally, his lips – those beautiful, sneering, perfect lips – touched Harry’s; gently at first, a careful warm press of skin on skin, but when Harry reached up to fist his good hand in Draco’s stupid sweatshirt to pull him closer, Draco deepened the kiss, his lips parting, tongue sweeping in to meet Harry’s, so hot and messy and good that Harry’s back arched of its own accord. Pain lanced through him but it mingled with the pleasure he felt at Draco’s touch and he didn’t mind, only tilted his head to get a better angle, wrapping his good arm around Draco’s neck and pulling him half on top of his own body, desperate for more contact as Draco sucked Harry’s lower lip into his mouth and bit down, hand tangling in Harry’s hair, lips on the stubble at his jaw, below his ear, down his neck, and –

“Well, you both seem to be feeling all right.”

Draco pulled away, cheeks pink. There was a smear of blood down his chin from where his cut lip had opened up, and it was a testament to how far gone Harry was that he found even this immeasurably sexy. He licked his own lips to try and get a taste. 

“Healer Kevari,” Draco said, sitting upright on his chair. His voice was perfectly even, perfectly mannered, and he wiped his chin neatly with his sleeve, like a gentleman at dinner. “How nice to see you.”

The round-faced old man gave a cheeky little nod, black eyes twinkling as he came into the room. “And you, Healer Malfoy.”

“It’s Professor Malfoy now,” Draco said, smiling faintly. “Although Draco would do in a pinch.”

“And Harry, hello,” said Healer Kevari, coming to stand over the couch where Harry lay. Harry, whose pulse was still pounding in his ears, lips still tingling where Malfoy had bitten them, managed what he hoped was a calm, not-dying-of-thwarted-ardor smile.

“Hi, Healer Kevari,” said Harry, who was more than familiar with the man. Kevari had been his attending Healer at St. Mungo’s. 

Kevari peered down at him and raised an eyebrow. “You’re looking well.”

Harry couldn’t help but laugh. This was an old joke between them and it meant, unfortunately, that Harry looked the opposite of well. It meant he looked like shit.

“I’m feeling well,” he answered. _I feel like shit._

“Draco,” Kevari said, “Healer Seidman will tend to you in the kitchen, if you don’t mind giving me a moment with Harry, here.”

“I did a preliminary examination on him,” started Draco, and Harry said “You did?” just as Kevari said, “Is that what the kids are calling it these days?”

“I did a preliminary examination,” Draco repeated, color high in his cheeks, “while he was unconscious, just to make sure nothing was broken. Or about to kill him, which I’m pleased to report nothing is – not internally, at any rate. If you wish, I’ll share the initial diagnostic.”

“You’re a patient today, not a Healer,” said Kevari, but he was smiling, clearly no stranger to Draco’s character. “Yes, show me what you’ve got.”

To Harry’s great interest, Draco raised his wand, which was glowing a soft yellow. Kevari leaned forward, eyes closed, and Draco gently touched his wand to the Healer’s temple, which lit up in that same soft yellow glow. They stood like that for a moment or two, both utterly focused, and Harry took the opportunity to have a long, hard, longing stare at Draco. 

“Oh dear,” said Kevari, opening his eyes and looking at Harry. 

“Well, I don’t _love_ the sound of that,” said Harry. 

“First order of business,” said Kevari, “is a strong pain potion, I think.”

“Yes please,” Harry said fervently. 

“Draco,” said Kevari, still looking at Harry, “I’d be glad to administer a much-needed potion to your friend, but I’m afraid I can’t do it until you’re sat down safely in the kitchen being looked-over by Healer Seidman.”

Draco raised the brow above his unbruised eye. “Are you bribing me, old man?”

“Will it work?”

“Yes,” said Draco, and looked down at Harry, his expression stern. “Be good.”

“You be good,” Harry sputtered. 

Draco made a small movement like he wanted to lean down and touch Harry again, and Harry’s entire body thrilled to the idea; but Draco checked himself at the last moment, nodded at Kevari, and vanished into the kitchen. 

“You don’t mind me kicking him out, do you?” said Kevari, settling himself in Draco’s vacated chair. “I seem to recall you’re not the biggest fan of… observers.”

“I’m not,” said Harry, though to his surprise he found that the idea didn’t bother him nearly as much as it had two years ago. He’d gotten used to being watched. “Er, about that pain potion…?”

Kevari was already squeaking a medical bag out of his expandable pocket, which he set on the floor with a thump before rummaging around in it. He came up with a glass vial of a familiar rust-colored liquid and Harry groaned.

“Barley-thorn? Haven’t you got anything that won’t make me see double?”

“Not at the strength level your diagnostic suggests you require,” said Kevari. “You know Barley-thorn’s the only thing that’ll get your muscles to loosen. Here, can you sit up?”

Harry supposed that seeing double was better than the alternative, which was feeling like half his body was being smashed by trolls. “I might need a hand,” he admitted. 

With Kevari’s assistance and a bit of swearing, Harry managed, finally, to get himself upright against the arm of the couch, and downed the Barley-thorn in one long gulp. Almost immediately, his sight began to blur and double -- but the relief was immediate, too, and he let out an involuntary sigh as his cramped hand began to relax, his fingers loosening from their tight curl, his shoulder unfreezing. His hip, which had been playing the part of a piece of wood, began to feel like a body part again, and his knee stopped feeling quite so much like a cup of hot lava. 

“Better?” said the two Kevaris.

Harry closed one eye, which made it easier to see straight. “Mmm.”

“Well,” said Kevari cheerfully, “now we know what happens when you flout all advice and completely overextend yourself. In bad weather, no less, which hasn’t helped matters at all.”

“I didn’t even do that much,” Harry protested. “Just some walking around. And – well, a bit of fighting, but hardly any!”

Kevari looked disbelieving. “Well, let’s have a look, shall we?”

Harry closed his other eye and let Kevari fuss over him for a few long minutes, the Healer’s wand tap-tapping across his body, prodding his joints, poking his muscles, sometimes feeling icy, sometimes tingly and hot. When he’d first been hurt, Harry had demanded to know and understand absolutely everything the Healers were doing to him and why, but by this point he didn’t care. He was just happy to be sitting on something soft with a pain tonic moving through his system and Draco Malfoy safe in the other room. Draco Malfoy, who _liked_ him. Who’d kissed him, and kissed him _well_.

“What’re you smiling about?” Kevari said, a smile in his own voice. “You’re about to be in a bed for a week.” 

Harry cracked an eye, alarmed. “I can’t stay in bed for a week. I have a job. You know, the thing that makes me money so I can pay gits like you.”

Kevari snorted. “Oh, are we in America now? You don’t pay me a knut. I happen to know _you_ spend all your money on liquor and handsome men.”

Harry laughed despite himself. “On a good day.” 

“You do need bed rest,” Kevari went on, “but not a week of it, I don’t think. A few hours a day should have you on the road to recovery. And lots of heat, as much of it as you can stand. Baths, hot compresses, warming charms… Your curse loves the cold, let’s not feed it. My main concern is your shoulder – did you hit it today?”

“Er, I think so,” he said, wincing at a flashback of himself tackling the goon in the Ragged Pony and hitting the floor; then at another memory of having his arm wrenched brutally behind his back; then another memory of hitting the basement wall. “I certainly didn’t treat it kindly. Draco said he thought it’d have to be immobilized.”

“Yes, well, Draco shouldn’t do my job for me, but he’s right,” said Kevari. “Your shoulder affects your back and neck and we don’t want to let that get too bad, or you’ll really be in trouble down the road. I see you’ve used a Locking charm on your knee recently, do you do that often?”

“Not often, no… a few times a month? Sometimes more.”

“You’ll want to limit it as much as possible, I’m afraid; it may keep you up but it’s putting undue strain on your hip, which’ll sideline you in the long run. But that’s a conversation for another time. For today, we’ll use a variation on that same Locking charm for your shoulder, but it’s absolutely imperative to have it in the right position before you Lock it, so pay close attention, all right?”

Harry let the Healer manhandle his shoulder into place, breathing shallowly while Kevari explained what he was doing and why, and though he tried to pay attention, he really did, the pain was distracting. And so was the thought of Draco’s lips on his, Draco’s hand in his hair, the breadth of his shoulders looming over Harry’s body… 

“Okay,” Kevari said, finishing the charm. “Can you repeat back what I just told you?”

“Er – something about – my neck –”

“He doesn’t take directions well,” Draco drawled from the doorway. 

Harry jerked his head up at the sound of his voice, then doubled over. “Aah –”

“I just finished telling you not to move your head too quickly,” said Kevari. “Among other things.” 

“Oh, sod off, all of you,” Harry muttered. He blinked at the Dracos who were sauntering over, four arms crossed over two ridiculous Muggle sweatshirts, two black eyes, two nose studs on two perfect noses. Dizzy, Harry shut his eye again and squinted up. Draco was singular again. “Are you all right?”

“I’m fine,” Draco said. “As predicted. Not even a concussion to show for my day of adventure.” He looked at Kevari. “Do you need to take him into St. Mungo’s?”

“Oh, I don’t think so,” said Kevari. “This house hasn’t got a Floo, however, and he’s in no shape to apparate on his own, so he’ll need a chaperone getting back to Hogwarts. If you wouldn’t mind, I think it’s best if you –"

“I’m a fully-grown man,” Harry interrupted, “and I’m sitting right here, you needn’t talk over me. Or _for_ me. Draco --?”

“Yes?”

“I’ll need a chaperone getting back to Hogwarts.” 

Draco sketched a mocking bow. “I’d be honored. Can you stand?”

“We’ll find out,” said Harry, somewhat grimly. “Pass me my cane?”

The answer, it turned out was yes, he could stand – kind of. It took both Kevari and Draco to get him to his feet, but once he was up he found he could walk all right, though it hurt even through the strong pain potion. He took a slow, limping turn around the living room, trying to limber up, grip tight on his cane and one eye squinted shut so he didn’t get dizzy from the Barley-thorn. He studiously did not reflect on the fact that his resemblance to Mad-Eye Moody must be in even greater effect than usual. 

“I sent a Patronus to Ronald Weasley and to McGonagall while I was in the kitchen,” said Draco. “We’ll apparate to the Brighton Floo and then Floo to the Weasley-Granger cottage in Hogsmeade, then take a carriage back to the castle.”

“Wait,” Harry said. “You. Sent a Patronus. To Ron.”

“Yes, and I even got one back. Very polite on both sides. I quote, _Glad to hear Harry didn’t kill himself finding you_ , which is easily the nicest thing he’s ever said to me.”

Harry laughed, delighted at the thought of the two of them corresponding in any manner, but his laughter died when Negasi appeared in the living room doorway. It wasn’t the sight of Negasi that dampened his spirits; it was the person flanking him. A tall, well-built older man with a clean-shaven face and grey hair pulled back in a ponytail. 

It was Roberts, Head Auror and Harry’s former mentor, who’d been training Harry to take his place when he retired. Harry hadn’t seen him since he’d left the Ministry and for some reason his appearance felt like a blow; a sudden, taunting reminder of every pointless plan he’d made, of a life he’d loved and had to leave behind, of everything he’d never do. 

Harry stood as straight as he could, wishing he was standing on his own, without the cane. He felt too-aware of how heavily he was leaning on it, too-aware of his left arm Locked tight down his side and across his stomach, one eye squeezed shut against double vision. 

“Potter,” said Roberts, with a nod. “You’re looking well.”

At this Harry could only laugh, thinking of his joke with Kevari, and behind him he heard the Healer chuckling, too. “I’m not,” said Harry, “but thanks all the same.”

Roberts smiled despite the fact that it was clear he didn’t know what he was meant to be smiling _at_ , and that was one of the reasons Harry had always liked him – the man was always up for a laugh, game for a joke. “Well, no,” Roberts conceded, “you look a right mess. What I meant was, it’s very good to see you.”

“You too,” Harry said. “But – and don’t take this the wrong way – why’re you here?” 

“To take you into the Ministry,” Roberts said. “You’re under arrest.”

Harry’s heart stopped. He took a shocked, stumbling step, and at his side Draco surged forward in a cloud of righteous anger, snarling “On what _possible_ grounds could you arrest –" but then he stopped, because Roberts was doubling over in laughter. 

“Merlin, your faces,” he said, wiping his eyes. “No, Potter, of course we’re not going to arrest you. We need an official statement is all, you know the protocol. You too, Malfoy. Come along.”

“I’m afraid I must object,” said Kevari, stepping forward. “This boy needs rest, and lots of it, as soon as possible.”

“Boy?” said Roberts, eyebrows shooting up. He looked at Harry. “Does he mean you? Last I checked you were a grown man. Anyway, you’re all right for a bit longer, aren’t you?”

In fact, Harry wanted nothing more than to get back to Hogwarts, draw a hot bath, pour himself a healthy glass of whiskey, and soak his aching body – and somewhere in there, maybe kiss Draco Malfoy a bit more. Or a lot more. On second thought, maybe sod the bath and whiskey and just kiss Draco, that sounded like a nice evening. 

But he couldn’t say any of that to Roberts. 

“Yeah, I’ll be fine,” Harry said, and glanced guiltily at Kevari, feeling like he was betraying him. The Healer tossed up his hands, looking exasperated but not angry. 

“It’s your own health,” Kevari said. “And as Auror Roberts so astutely pointed out, you’re a grown man. No one can stop you doing foolish things.”

“Oh, come on,” Roberts said. “An hour, tops, then we’ll get you home and tucked into bed.”

“Er,” Negasi said, speaking up at last. “On second thought, it could wait til tomorrow, couldn’t it? Harry, you look a bit – a bit –”

“Cadaverous,” supplied Draco. 

Harry did not like standing around being told how terrible he looked. “Tomorrow will be a hassle,” he said. “I’ll have to skive off work again, get down to Hogsmeade so I can get to the Ministry – no, now is best. I’m already up and about.”

“Excellent,” said Roberts, rubbing his hands together. “I’ve got temporary Floo authorization for the Debs’ fireplace, so we can go straight there.”

He strode off towards the fireplace, Negasi in his wake, though he kept glancing worriedly back at Harry.

“Thanks for everything, Healer Kevari,” Harry said, a bit shamefaced. 

“I’ll be seeing you soon enough, if you don’t take my advice and get some rest,” the Healer scolded. “Draco, you’ll look out for him, won’t you?”

“He’s not my minder,” Harry said indignantly, “he’s my – my – my colleague.”

Kevari looked deeply amused, and too-late Harry remembered that the Healer had seen them in a rather compromising position. “Is that what he is?” Kevari said. “Hogwarts must be a fascinating place to work, if that’s how one treats one’s colleagues there.”

“I’ll keep an eye on him,” Draco said blandly, and put a careful hand on Harry’s back to guide him towards the fireplace. In a much quieter voice, as they picked their way across the pink rug, he said, “Are you sure you’re up for this?”

“Not you too,” Harry grumbled. 

“Yes, obviously, me too. You can barely keep your feet.”

Harry smiled at Roberts, who was waiting for them by the fireplace. To Draco he said, through clenched teeth, “I think I’m doing rather well. I haven’t fallen yet, at any rate.”

Draco sighed. “If that’s our barometer for _well_ …”

As if on cue, Harry’s traitorous knee gave out. But it was only briefly, and Harry caught himself on his cane, giving himself a moment to test the joint before putting the barest amount of weight back on it. He wanted to Lock it, and would have, except Kevari had just warned him off the practice and he was still back there, watching everything, an infuriatingly skeptical expression on his little old face. Roberts, thank Merlin, didn’t seem to have noticed.

“Looks like you’ll have to stay close,” Harry said, voice low. “I might need to grab onto you.”

“Not if I grab you first,” Draco murmured, and Harry, even though he’d started it, flushed scarlet.

“Negasi and I are off,” announced Roberts. He and Negasi were crowded into the fireplace. “You two’ll follow right behind?”

“See you –” Negasi started, but the flames were already shooting up green and the two aurors were spinning and blurring and vanishing in a jet of smoke.

“Not too late to change your mind,” Draco said as they stepped into the fire. 

“Are _you_ up for this?” Harry said, suddenly worried. “You’ve had a worse day than I have and they’re going to ask you to relive it for your statement. I know what it’s like, to – to be tied up like that, and –”

“I’m fine,” Draco said quickly. “Barely a scratch on me.”

“It isn’t visible scratches I’m talking about,” Harry said, searching his face. 

“Hang on,” Draco said, and put an arm around Harry’s waist, pulling him close and holding him there decisively, and though Harry recognized a distraction when he felt one, it was a very effective distraction. Draco was strong and steady at his side, and even the rushing nausea of the Floo and the stabbing pain as they whipped through space wasn’t enough to take away from the pure pleasure of the physical contact. 

Merlin, but life was strange. Never in a thousand years could his school-age self have imagined that one day he’d be clinging to Draco fucking Malfoy and loving it. 

Then again, neither would he have imagined he’d be clinging to Draco fucking Malfoy because a significant percentage of his limbs no longer quite functioned. 

His shit knee buckled again as they were spat out into the Ministry Floo, but he managed to stay on his feet thanks to Draco’s firm grip, and it was the work of only a few seconds to regain his balance. Roberts and Negasi were waiting for them just outside the fireplace, and Negasi, who’d clearly seen him stumble, gave Harry a quick, worried smile as he limped into the hall. 

“All right, Harry?” he asked. 

But Harry didn’t answer. He was grappling with the sight of the hallway, wooden-walled and candle-sconced, the scent of fire and magic and coffee permeating every corner, familiar sounds coming from behind familiar doors: little bangs, big rattles, someone yelling, someone laughing. The Auror department, where he’d come every day for nearly ten years, longer even than he’d been at Hogwarts; where he’d made a place for himself, proven himself over and over, risen through the ranks, had a second coming-of-age – turned into a grownup. 

He hadn’t returned since he’d been hurt, and it hit him like a blow. 

“Welcome back,” Roberts said. 

“I’ve missed this place,” Harry said, breathing in that old familiar scent. 

“We’ve missed you, too,” Roberts said, his expression suddenly, and uncharacteristically, serious. “Quite a lot, in fact.”

“Let’s get you sat down,” Negasi said, exchanging a look with Draco, who still had a hand on Harry’s back. “My office is just there. You might remember it, Harry, seeing as it used to be yours. I’ve redecorated a bit… more badgers, fewer lions, for one thing…”

“Lead the way,” Harry said, and began moving through the halls of his old life.


End file.
